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soul and therefore, they do not allow the knowledge to manifest itself. Soul has infinite energy of knowledge, or in other words soul has infinite knowledge in the form of potential energy. As a seed contains a large Banyan tree in the form of energy or a dormant form, in the same way soul has infinite dormant capacity for knowledge but the knowledge-obscuring karma obstructs it from manifesting itself. Knowledge manifests in proportion to the destruction-cum-suppression of the knowledge-obscuring karma and when this karma is completely destroyed or shed, kevala-jñāna (infinite knowledge or omniscience) appears in absence of the cause of obstruction
Knowledge is an inherent attribute of soul. It does not come from outside; neither does it come from books or from a teacher. Had knowledge been a thing to transect, all the students of a teacher would have become scholars; every candidate appearing in an examination would have got equal marks. But the reality is otherwise; in a class some students are bright and others dull, some pass and others fail. Some uneducated individuals are very prudent and some educated ones are foolish. All this depends on the destruction-cum-suppression of jñānāvaraṇīya karma but in any case, irrespective of the realm and genus, it is certain that every being has some knowledge.
DARŠANĀVARANĪYA KARMA
The karma that obscures or obstructs the capacity of perception of a soul is called Darśanāvaraṇīya karma. Like Jñanavaraṇa, this karma does not allow the capacity of perception of soul to manifest. Soul is endowed with the power and capacity to perceive directly and instantaneously any substance with all its modes and attributes in all the three sections of time (past, present, and future). In terms of the inherent attribute of perception the soul has a capacity of infinite perception. A worldly soul can be said to possess infinite knowledge and infinite perception in context of dormant capacity but at the present moment that has not manifested itself fully. The attribute of infinite perception has been obstructed by Darsanāvaraṇīya karma.
A person may have eyes and other sense organs but he is unable to see or his vision is not perfect, or he has other defects in other sense organs. All these shortcomings are caused by fruition of Darsanāvaraṇīya karma. This karma is also responsible for various
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