Harmless Soul

Author(s): W J Johnson, Dayanand Bhargav
Publisher: Motilal Banarasidas

Page 63

Umāsvāti's Jainism 49 Thānamga, and the Uttarajjhayana, among others. 11 These show that at Tattvārtha Sūtra 6:1 Umāsvāti changed the traditional sequence of the threefold yoga (manas, vāc, kāya) into kāya, vāc, and manas. According to Ohira, he probably did this because he attached most importance to kāyikakriyā. 12 But leaving aside the likelihood that the most important element would in fact be placed last, all the evidence points in the opposite direction: in the canonical texts the emphasis is on the physical and material, and it is Umāsvāti who starts to switch the emphasis to 'internal' action. The change in order is therefore probably not significant. (Devanandin, commenting on Tattvārtha Sūtra 2:25, uses the order vāc, manas, kāya.)
More importantly, Ohira points out that the definition of āsrava as threefold yoga is given for the first time in the Tattvārtha Sūtra (at 6:2).13 (Tattvārtha Sūtra 6:2 can mean that yoga is either the cause of āsrava or that it is itself āsrava; but there is no real ambiguity here, since it is clear that yoga and äsrava are pragmatically synonymous, in the sense that any activity automatically causes the influx of karmic matter.) A further innovation of Umāsvāti's is to classify yoga as śubha ('virtuous' or 'good'), giving rise to punya (merit), or aśubha ('wicked' or 'bad'), giving rise to pāpa (demerit) (Tattvārtha Sūtra. 6:3).14
11 See Ohira p. 61. The identification of Umāsvāti's sources in what follows relies mostly on this work.
12 Ibid. p. 62.
13 Ibid.
14 See ibid. Ohira claims that yoga belongs theoretically to a 'neutral category', but that Umāsvāti reads it in terms of subha-aśubha on the basis of the absence or presence of kasāya (ibid.). However, this analysis seems to be wrong on both counts, since, first, it is Umāsvāti himself who makes yoga into a 'neutral category' precisely through the introduction of the kaşāya doctrine. The underlying feeling of early canonical Jainism, as has been made clear, is that virtually all yoga leads to āsrava and bondage, and is thus ipso facto to be avoided. Only when the kaşāya doctrine (that the binding power of action depends upon the internal state or attitude of the individual) is introduced, is it possible to conceive of yoga as being either binding or not (i.e.