________________
Conclusions
Commenting on the juxtaposition of the archaic and the classical in Jaina doctrine - on the tradition's incompletely worked-out philosophy and its tendency to fantastic proliferation - Frauwallner concludes that all this is the result of fundamental adherence to the doctrines proclaimed by Mahāvīra.1 Because the Jina is omniscient, his doctrines, once uttered, could not be changed or displaced, and that 'explains the many antique features which the system has preserved'.2 There was no room for consistent developments in thought, or for 'the erection of a uniformly compact doctrinal edifice'.3 In these circumstances, according to Frauwallner, it is not surprising that wherever the 'traditionally handed-down dogmatics showed a lacuna', fantasy was allowed to flourish without a check.4 In short, Jaina thought after Mahāvīra was paralysed by the need to preserve the often archaic content of Mahāvīra's teaching in more sophisticated religious and philosophical circumstances.
There is evidently some truth in this analysis, but as it stands it remains an inadequate explanation because Frauwallner has divorced Jaina beliefs and doctrines fro: practice; he is concerned with Jainism as a 'philosophy rather than as a religion. The two levels of doctrine regarding activity, the influx of karma and bondage, which are imposed upon each other and which fit so incompletely, are the result of two different historical processes - within Jainism and within Indian religion in general - which come together over a particular period. These two processes may, for short, be labelled 'Early Jainism' and 'Umāsvāti's
Frauwallner (1973) Vol. II, p. 213.
2 Ibid. 3 Ibid.
4 Ibid. p. 214.
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