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14
Gommatesvara Commemoration Volume
(right conduct). The theories which do not emphasise the moral responsibility of individual selves are not to be accepted as absolutely real. Moral excellence is as much important as right knowledge and right understanding for self-realisation. The path of virtue is the path leading to the realisation of truth. The five vratas: ahimsa (non-violence), sarya (pursuit of truth), asteya (non-stealing and honesty), brahmacarya (celibacy) and aparigraha (non-possession and non-attachment) are the fundamental virtues. However, the practice of vratas is graded. A distinction is drawn between the moral codes for the ascetic (muni) and for the layman (śravaka). The munis (ascetics) have to practise the vratas rigorously. But the śravaka has social responsibilities. They have to practise the vows with lesser degree of rigour
The practice of non-violence is the most important principle of the Jainas. Ahinsa paramodharmah is the cardinal principle of Jaina view of life. Ahimsa is non-injury, physical and mental. One should not hurt another in body, mind and speech, one should avoid directly causing injury to a living being, one should not cause others to commit injury, nor should one consent to the causing of injury. Himsa (injury) is the hurt caused to a living being through negligence, intentionally or under the grip of impulses and emotional stress. Himsă caused without the slightest intention and awareness in the pursuit of one's duties in society need not be branded as himsā. For instance, the farmer ploughing the field. although he has awareness that possible injury would be caused to numerous tiny creatures, cannot be avoided in the larger good of society. Similarly a soldier has to fight with the enemy for the righteous cause, although he may detest fighting. has to do so as duty. This is virodha himhsa and it is permitted. The Jaina scriptures did not preach, as has been very often misunderstood, the practice of unqualified and abstract principle of ahimsa to the extent of the ridiculous. A citizen should be free from sthüla himhsa. Gandhiji said that nonviolence is the virtue of the brave. A coward has no moral strength to observe nonviolence. Gandhiji said that a mouse hardly forgives a cat when it allows itself to be torn to pieces by her.
The Jaina concept of nonviolence has influenced the way of thought for centuries. Ahimsa has been the very fibre of the Indian Weltanschauung. There were frequent protests against the animal sacrifices in the Upanisads. In the Chandogya Upanisad life has been described as a great festival in which qualities like tapas, ahimsa are important. The protests against animal sacrifices were more pronounced from the Buddhist and the Jainas. In our time Gandhiji's weapon of Satyagraha has been built up on the analysis of ahimsa by the Jainas, Gandhiji has stated that he derived benefit from the Jaina religious works as from the scriptures of other great faiths." Polak said that the first 5 vows of Gandhiji were the code of Jaina monks during the two thousand years." Zimmer writes that Gandhiji's programme of Satyagraha as an expression of ahimsa is a serious,
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