Introduction to Jainism

Author(s): Rudi Jansma, Sneh Rani Jain
Publisher: Prakrit Bharti Academy

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INTRODUCTION TO JAINISM
according to Jainism. By living in the soul, every human can become a god.
What makes the Jains especially noteworthy is that they not only preach and talk about non-violence, but also practice it. I happened to come across a small diagram from 1891 – that is, from before the influence of modern times - giving the percentage of prisoners in India as related to religion. The Jains were by far the best: 1 in 6165 citizens. On the other side of the scale, the figures for Jews and Christians were 1 in 481 and 477 respectively. The attitude of the Jains is neither extreme nor extravagant. In fact they are the ones who behave “normally.” The social morality of the Jains as well as their doctrine of redemption is interspersed with rules and guidelines which are all derived from this same principle of ahimsā. The five main vows which every Jain is supposed to respect are: to abstain from violence, to abstain from lying (i.e.: violence against truth), to abstain from stealing, to abstain from sexual misconduct, and to be free from worldly attachment. In addition, every Jain is supposed to think and meditate about friendship with all living beings, the happiness it may give when seeing that others have more success than oneself (especially in spiritual matters), compassion for all suffering beings, and tolerance or indifference towards those who behave in an uncivil or negative way towards oneself.
Ahimsā is the opposite of himsā, violence. What is meant by violence is clearly defined in scriptures which the Jains regard as authoritative. To quote just a few:
From the Tattvārthadhigama Sūtra: Violence (himsā) is to hurt the prānas (vitalities) through vibration due to the passions, which agitate mind, body or speech (vii: 13).
From the Purushārthasiddhi-upāya: Any injury to the material or conscious vitalities caused by passionate activity of mind, body or speech is certainly called