Facets of Jaina Religiousness in Comparative Light

Author(s): L M Joshi
Publisher: L D Indology Ahmedabad

Page 61

FACETS OF JAINA RELIGIOUSNESS
state of pure-existence (parama-gati, siddha-gati or mokşa-gati). They symbolize the supreme ideal of Holiness and beatitude called mokşa.
The question has often been raised and discussed in several Jaina treatises that in the pañca-namaskāra-mantra the first to be invoked are the arhats and not the siddhas. In the enumeration of holy beings in this sacred formula the topmost class of beings has been relegated to the second position. Why? One possible answer to this question is that the siddhas symbolize the End whereas the arhats or tirthankaras symbolize the Means. The siddhahood represents the end of Jainism in the sense of the ultimate goal of religious culture, as well as in the sense of the termination of Jaina method (märga). The method terminates in mokṣa which is identical with siddhagati. The arhats, on the other hand, are a kind of saviour-gods and torchbearers; they help sentient beings by preaching the method of achieving mokşa. They lead along the way to siddhahood. It is the functional value or practical religious relevance of the arhats for suffering beings which is indicated by their first position in the formula of five-fold obeisance. Teaching the method of purification is a kind of activity, a form of karma, which is impossible in the state of disembodied existence enjoyed by the siddhas. They are, therefore, inaccessible to beings in samsāra, because they have gone beyond the sphere of karma and samsāra. The arhats are merciful and they promulgate the Dharma in the world of beings. They are the supreme spiritual gurus and therefore, they are invoked first. This is also the traditional explanation of placing the arhats before the siddhas in the litany of obeisance. Nevertheless, the spiritual supremacy of the siddha over the arhat is an acknowledged doctrinal point. The arhats pay homage to the siddhas at the time of joining the order. The siddhas symbolize the changeless and eternal state of perfection whereas an arhat is still wearing his last body waiting for the final leap to the siddhahood.
Buddhist texts, let us not forget here, make a distinction between sopadhiseşanirvāṇa and anupadhiseşa-nirvāņa; likewise, the Vedantic texts make a distinction between jīvanmukti and videhamukti. The word upadhi refers to the skandhas, the personality factors, which constitute the embodied state. When an arhat is released from the skandhas or personality factors, he attains the ultimate Release. He is then lost to the world, so to say, and his state cannot be described in words.
It is out of conern for the spiritual weal and welfare of the world of sentient beings that the Mahāyānasūtras insist on the ideal of a Bodhisattva and eulogize the practice of uiversal ethical virtues (pāramitās) like liberality, morality, forbearance, energy, meditation, wisdom and so on. Once a saint wins his release, it is pointed out, he ceases to be compassionate and active. A genuinely universal soteriology is made accessible to beings lost in the forest of darkness (avidya) and harassed by the storm of miseries of conditioned existence through the kind activities of jīvanmukta