Jain Journal 1974 07

Author(s): Jain Bhawan Publication
Publisher: Jain Bhawan Publication

Page 19

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JAIN JOURNAL
kinds of pride are detailed namely pride of birth, pride of race, pride of beauty, pride of strength, etc., and last but not the least spiritual pride. Humility will therefore be correct equivalent for this anga. Upagohana or covering up the defects of others or in other words charity of disposition ; Vätsalya or love of maternal type ; dispassionate and selfless. The other three argas may be considred to be derivatives. They are Amūdhadsști or freedom from superstitions ; Sthitikaraṇa or to confirm others in the right path and Prabhāvanā or proclaiming the glory of the true religion.
If true experience implies or leads to all these virtues one can hardly differentiate between mysticism and the religion of love which the critics of mysticism profess to admire. Jaina ethics also makes it clear that the experience should not arise from excitement of any kind or use of intoxicants, or from morbidity. Salvation is denied to a diseased body. The experience must come to a person in robust health, physically and mentally, if any value is to be attached to it.
The theory of salvation is practically a development of this idea of Darśana. The form in which the experience apparently came to Mahavira is clear from the above analysis. It did not in his case take the form of a concrete vision which may be described as a vision of the divine in a particular aspect. Had it been so, he would not have had any further quest before him, whereas he spent 12 years in meditation on the meaning of his experience.
An incident from one of the Purānas (Sri Mallinātha Purāņa) may be cited in support of these views. A Jaina Raja named Vaisramana approaches a saint and asks him for the gift of Samyaktya, The saint explains to him that Samyaktya may come to one spontaneously whether he is a recluse or a layman, even a sinner, or it may come as a result of discipline and meditation. Since it had not come to the Raja spontaneously he should adopt discipline and meditation. The Raja says that this course was difficult for him to follow. He is then asked to follow the life of a pious layman and wait for his chance to get Samyaktva. This also the Raja said was too difficult for him. Then the saint tells him that the only other thing he could try was ritual that is to say worship of the drawing of a lotus flower with eight petals representing the eight angas of Samyag Darśana and with luck he might in course of time get the true experience.
In a word, Samyag Darsana is self-realization. It will therefore be seen that which is generally considered the goal in most religious systems