Harmless Soul

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

Page 87

Umāsvāti's Jainism 73 only the monk or nun has the potential to cease from parigraha and ārambha, and thus attain mokşa. The idea that acts involving the employment of human and animal labour were particularly sinful, and others less so, does not appear in the earliest doctrinal layer. There, all acts which harm jīvas are considered to be effectively binding. Indeed, the householder only puts in an appearance in these texts to act as a kind of lighthouse, warning the ascetic away from, or at least setting severe limits to, social contact. The householder's inevitable rebirth and suffering are pointed out, like wreckages, as a warning to those who come too close or are tempted to return to life in the world.
In later Jaina theory, however, the pious householder is considered to be on the same soteriological continuum as the monk: the former may take partial vows (aņuvrata) which are seen as preparing him or her for the eventual assumption of the mahāvrata of the mendicant.66 Thus while the aņuvrata of ahimsā, which applies only to trasa beings, can never be soteriologically sufficient - it cannot lead in itself to liberation - it is nevertheless a step upwards on the ladder which leads to mokşa; one can expect at least a better rebirth. Such a progression is never contemplated in the very earliest textual layers, where the idea of a 'pious' householder is not even admitted. Indeed, such a concept would be a contradiction in terms.
Moreover, according to later Jaina doctrine, parigraha is defined as mūrcchā,67 'infatuation' or the 'delusion of possession'. 68 In the Sarvārthasiddhi mūrcchā is glossed as 'not turning away from the aims of acquiring and keeping conscious and unconscious externals, such as cows, buffaloes, jewels, pearls, possessions, etc., and
66 See JPP p. 160ff. 67 TS 7:17. 68 JPP p. 177.