Jain Journal 1997 01

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

Page 19

JAIN JOURNAL: Vol-XXXI, No. 3 January 1997
together to fulfill God's providence. It has its own ontology, epistemology, logic, axiology, ethics, theory of original human nature, theory of history, theory of education, theory of art, and theory of methodology. For details, the readers are directed to refer to the Unification Thought, pub. by the Unification Thought Institute, N.Y., 1973.
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This paper is based on Explaining Unification Thought (pub. by the Unification Thought Institute, N.Y., 1981), and the Divine Principle (pub. by the Holy Spirit Association for the Unification of World Christianity, N.Y., 1977). We will introduce in the following a brief view of history offered in these texts first, then work on a review of Jainism made in the context of the Unification view of history.
The Unification View of History
History started with the fall of man, and therefore man has had to suffer its consequence of miseries. All three Testaments, i.e. Old, New and Completed, agree on this point. According to the Completed Testament, God as the spiritual Parent, created Adam and Eve in his image, so that they would become His substantial objects of love, and multiply His children on earth to have happy families, societies and the world. This ideal world is the kingdom of heaven on earth. As the chart (quoted from The Divine Principle, p.137, which is slightly modified with some additional information) below shows, man was expected to go through a period of growth in three stages under archangel Lucifer's care, while keeping the promise with God not to eat the fruits of the Tree of Life and Tree of Knowledge in the Garden of Eden; that is, not to commit fornication. This growth period of man is called the period of God's indirect dominion, in which God does not interfare with the decisions of man. Beyond this, that is, after perfecting their individual personalities, Adam and Eve were to be placed under God's direct dominion, and marry to have His children.
At the final level of the growth stage, Eve disobeyed Him, and committed fornication with Lucifer in spirit, then with Adam in flesh. This sin is known as original sin, from which all other types of sin and man's fallen natures are derived. Lucifer then dominated not only Adam's family, but also the entire world through procreation, and stood as Satan or the False God against the True God. All men have thus become the children of the Devil, inheriting the Satanic lineage. Ever since, we have been confined in this Satanic world. All things created by God did not fall. Man after the fall was cut off from God's lineage, and thereby fell below the level of all things into the hellish realm of non-principle, as shown on the chart.