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OCTOBER, 1967
well-known for their fasts which often run for days and weeks without a break, and the annual fasting during the Paryuṣaṇa is followed by universal greeting of forgiveness for unpleasant deeds done, thought or said by body, mind or tongue.
95
It is indeed a marvel that a small community like the Jainas who are the representatives of the śramana culture has survived through the ravages of time. The author attributes this to several factors of which the most important perhaps is the excellent organisation of the community. For this, H. Jacobi has paid eloquent tributes to it in the following words, "It cannot be doubted that this close union between laymen and monks brought about by the similarity of their religious duties, differing not in kind, but in degree, has enabled Jainism to avoid fundamental changes within, and to resist dangers from without for more than two thousand years, while Buddhism, being less exacting as regards the laymen, underwent the most extraordinary evolutions and finally disappeared in the country of its origin." This however should not give impression that the Jaina community lies on a bed of roses. From outside, the Jaina community had to survive against the attacks by people belonging to the Vedic order; from inside the community lost its strength by the growth of too many castes and subcastes. "Naturally, the castes have fostered separatist tendencies, have created cultural gulfs between the castes and have stood in the way of social unity in the Jaina community." And the author suggests that if the Jainas are to flourish as a community, for which there is no reason why they should not, they must uproot the factors that generate caste-consciousness forthwith. This indeed may not be a very easy job; and yet there is no escape from it either.
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