Int Jain Sangh NJ 2003 04 Mahavir Jayanti

Author(s): Int Jain Sangh NJ
Publisher: USA International Jain Sangh IJS

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JAINISM AND ITS MODERN-DAY RELEVANCE -Views of Professor Padmanabh Jaini
Bondage and Salvation
The object of "search" for a spiritually oriented Jain is his true identity. The body obviously could not be the self because it perishes. If you do not believe - as Christianity and some other religions do - in a single existence of the soul on earth followed by eternal heaven or hell, but you believe in the reincarnation of the soul as all Indian religions do, then you must define yourself by asking such question as: "Who am I, how do I come to have this body, what could be my relation with other fellow beings who also are caught up in this cycle of rebirth?" The Jains and the Buddhists deny any role for a "Creator God" either in the creation or in the salvation of souls. They believe that the souls have existed from beginningless times in the state of embodiment and will continue till eternity in that state, unless a way can be found to break this cycle. Instead of a single God the Jains have a series of teachers. Instead of bondage alone, there is bondage plus a possibility of salvation. The autonomy of soul is always maintained and this gives it a choice of bondage or salvation. You can say that a Jain is a person who chooses a path of salvation as shown by the Jinas.
The Jains understand bondage as the binding of the soul with the non-soul. The non-soul is matter; characterized by a certain touch, taste smell and color. In its gross form it is the body and the physical apparatus of the senses and the mind. These are supported and fashioned by a certain subtle and invisible matter capable of turning into karma and hence called the Karmic matter. The Jains are distinguished from other Indian religions by their doctrine that this mass of inanimate karmic matter pervades the whole universe. In a process which has no beginning in time, this subtle matter is automatically attracted to the soul when the latter, ignorant of its true nature, is charged with passions like attachment and aversion. Thus bound, it obstructs the qualities of the soul such as knowledge, purity and bliss; just as fine dust floating around might settle on the wet surface of a mirror and block its capacity to reflect objects.
The entire teaching can be summed up by one Sanskrit word: samvara (stopping of the influx). The influx of the karmic matter is going on continuously and it must result in bondage. The Jains believe that it is possible to stop this influx, as aspiration for emancipation (moksha) is innate to the soul. The soul's ability to seek the true nature of itself and to overcome the passions is never totally destroyed by the mass of karma that surrounds it. This innate power of the soul can be developed fully by renouncing all attachment to worldly possessions as well as to the passions, in short: by following the ascetic path of the Jinas. Indeed it is hard to follow the ascetic path. But the Jains have also laid out an easier path for the lay people. This path lays out progressive stages through which a layperson practices samvara that leads to the life of an ascetic only towards the end of his active life as a householder. But even without following a formal discipline most Jains may be said to follow the minimum required of them: as for example, their practice of vegetarianism. Given the fact that human beings are not
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