Gandhi Before Gandhi

Author(s): Bipin Doshi, Priti Shah
Publisher: Jain Academy Educational Research Center Promotion Trust Mumbai

Page 100

GANDHI BEFORE GANDHI
no creditors, the state in which we live without any creditors is a perfectly free condition. That is the liberated condition
Jain ethics, which direct our conduct to be so adapted as to ensure the fullest development of the soul the highest level of happiness, i.e. the goal of human conduct, which is the ultimate end of human action. Jainism teaches to look upon all living beings as upon one's own self. What then is the mode of attaining the highest happiness? The sacred books of the Brahmans prescribe devotion and Karma (here it means good deeds without expectation of rewards). The Vedanta indicates the path of knowledge as the means to the highest. But Jainism goes a step farther and says that the highest happiness is to be obtained by knowledge and religious observances of its ethical laws. The five Mahavratas or great commandments or vows for Jain ascetics are not to kill i.e. to protect all life; not to lie; not to take that which is not given; to abstain from sexual intercourse and to renounce all materialistic world (Aparigral). The laity is supposed to follow 12 types of vows (Vratas); which are less strict compared to those of ascetics; details of these are beyond the scope of this book.
The universe is not for man alone, but is a theater of evolution for all living beings. Live and let live is its guiding principle. Alimsa Parmo Dharma - Non-injury is the highest religion. The ceremonial worship, institutions, manners and customs of pure Jains all rest on this grand fulcrum of Alimsa. Man desires to continue his life forces, so that he may do the highest good while living here. He is compelled to destroy life for his survival; but the lesser and lower forms of life he destroys, the less harmful Karmas he generates and imbibes. This is the basis of the strict vegetarianism followed by the Jains. Acting on that idea, they have built homes for the maimed or old animals in many cities and towns of India, where they are fed and taken care of until they die their natural death. The preaching of that grand principle has almost entirely superseded the Brahmin practice of sacrifices of animals.
All living beings have to pass through or evolve from the lowest, the nomadic condition, to the highest state of existence, and cannot reach this unless they obtain possession of the three things necessary - right belief, right knowledge and right conduct, known as Samyak Darshan, Samyak Gyan and Samyak Caritra.
We think that we are superior to others because our tenants who live on the ground floor are inferior to us, but we have no right therefore to crush those tenants, who later on may acquire the right to inhabit the second and third floors and finally the highest floor. One living on the highest plane has no right to crush those who live on the lowest plane. If one thinks that he has a right to do this, he has no sufficient strength to live without destroying others life. Our philosophy says that it is a sin to destroy any form of life, and it remains only to choose the lowest form, the less sinful. We, in business take such a kind of business which will yield the most profit and will cause us to lose the least, in which we have fewer liabilities; and the limiting condition will be that, in which we have no liabilities, and
The right belief is really speaking a state of total faith in teachings of Jinas, the right knowledge means all that knowledge and wisdom which helps one to have spiritual progress and right conduct means all those actions which are required for spiritual progress. This in Jainism is called Ratnatrayi-three jewels.