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ETHICAL DOCTRINES IN JAINISM
OTHER MŪLAGUNAS: Not taking bath, sleeping on the pure ground or on a slab of stone, plank of wood, or dry grass, not cleansing the teeth, taking meals in the standing posture in the palm of one's own hand, and accepting meals once a day after three Gharis of sunrise and the same period before sunset: all these have been considered to be the rest of the Müla gunas. It may be pointed out that the Svatāmbara monk sleeps on a plank and consumes food in the pot.
Thus the saint dedicates his integral energies to the cessation and shedding of Karmas. In consequence he regards the subjugation of parīşahas (afflictions) and practice of Tapas (austerities) as falling within the compass of his obligations. The saint allows no compromise with anything entangling him in the mire of Samsāra. His career is indicative of his complete detachment from mundane life and living. Anything incompatible with, and discordant to, his second birth in a holy world, anything which drags him down to breathe in the suffocating air of the profane world must needs be subdued, strangled and overthrown. If the Parīşahas are not met with the adequate attitude and disposition of mind, they would tend to mar the saintly life; on the contrary, if they are encountered with the inner conviction of truth, and invaded by the non-violent army of fortitude, meditation and devotion, they would confer jubilation, and yield the joy of victory. And if the austerities are spiritedly practised they would bring about the inner rejection of desire, which would let the aspirant experience unalloyed happiness far beyond the joys of this world or of any heaven. The overcoming of the Parīşahas results in stopping the influx of Karmas, whereas the observance of austerities serves two-fold purpose of holding up, in the first instance, the inflow of fresh Karma and wiping off, on the other, the accumulated filth of Karmas. We first proceed to the question of getting over the Parīşahas.
PARISAHAS: THEIR ENUMERATION AND EXPOSITION: Those afflictions that are to be endured for the purpose of not swerving from the path of stopping and dissociating Karmas are termed Parīşahas. The Uttarādhyayana tells us that "a monk must learn and know, bear and conquer, in order not to be vanquished by them (Parīşahas) when he
1 Anagā. Dharma. Comm. LX-91; Bodha Pāhuda. 56. 2 Mülā. 31 to 35, 811. 3 Ta. Su. IX. 2. 4 Ta. Sü. IX. 3. 5 Ta. Sū. 8.
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