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Uttaradhyayana
mitting sins. He indirectly criticises also bathing in a holy bathingplace (like Prayaga, a celebrated place of pilgrimage at the confluence of Ganga and Yamuna) with a view to washing away sins when he declares:
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The dharma is my pond, celibacy my holy bathing-place... there I bathe...and get rid of my impurities of sins (also hatred). (XII. 46).
He lays stress on the great value of penance and makes light of birth in a high or exalted family. In fact, Harikeśa as well as Citra-Sambhuta legends illustrate how a svapaka, detested by all people for being born in the lowest caste, by taking to asceticism reaches the highest place of perfection. These legends bear testimony to the fact that the Jain dharma does not believe in untouchability nor in caste-superiority.
Finally, the Jain criticism of Vedic (animal) sacrifices: Jainism prescribes ahimsa (non-violence or non-injury to living beings) as the first and foremost of its five fundamental or basic vratas (vows). Every follower of Jainism must observe this vrata by abstaining from violence or injury to living beings, in thought, word or deed, together with its causal and permissive variations. With such a great emphasis on ahimsa, the attitude of Jainism towards sacrifices involving slaughter of animal is bound to be one of uncompromising dissent and bitter hostility. The Uttaradhyayana, the first mulasutra which is one of the most valuable portions of the Jain agama, on one occasion declares:
The binding of animals (to the sacrificial pole), all the Vedas, and sacrifices, being the causes of sin, cannot save the sinner; for his karmans are very powerful (XXV. 30).
In the Lecture on Harikeśa there is a passage interpreting a sacrifice spiritually which deserves special attention:
"He who is well fortified by the five samvaras (preventing by means of the samitis and guptis the asrava, the flowing in of the karman upon the soul), is not attached to this life, abandons his bod (in the kayotsarga posture), who is pure and does not
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