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Harmless Souls
holds good as long as caritra itself is seen predominantly in terms of restraint from external, physical action; Kundakunda, however, makes it clear at the beginning of the Pravacanasāra that for him căritra too is essentially something internal, a matter of attitude. In this work, as will become evident, căritra is intimately linked to the attainment of jñana through dhyāna, rather than to the practice of external tapas. Thus, for Kundakunda, samyakcăritra becomes merely an augmentation to, or instrument of, samyag-jñāna, whereas the classical view is that it is samyag-jñāna which results in samyak-cāritra, and that it is the latter which is soteriologically crucial.5
Evidence of this internalisation is provided at the beginning of the Pravacanasara. There, in gāthā 1:6, it is stated that the jīva attains nirvāṇa by conduct (căritra) which has as its most important component perception and knowledge (darśana and jñāna).6 Such conduct, as the Tattvadīpikā explains, is that which is free from attachment (vītaraga). However, in the next gāthā, cāritra is given a more precise definition:
Conduct is indeed dharma; dharma is defined as equanimity [sama]; for equanimity is a modification of the self which is free from delusion and disturbance (or 'the disturbance of delusion'). [Pravacanasara 1:7]
That is to say, ideal conduct is an attitude of calmness (sama), an absence of passion, not a particular course of external, physical conduct. It is something that occurs internally, transforming the essential self (cf.1:8); i.e. caritra is internalised to a bhāva or mental state (see 1:9). Pravacanasara 1:11 goes on to say that if the self which
5 See the SS on TS 1.1: 'knowledge is mentioned before conduct, for conduct issues from knowledge' - trans. by S.A. Jain p. 4, of: cāritrāt pūrvam jñānam prayuktam, tatpūrvakatvāc căritrasya.
6
jīvassa carittādo damsaṇa
sampajjadi nivvāṇam ṇāṇappahāṇādo - Pravac. 1:6.
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