Jain Philosophy

Author(s): Virchand R Gandhi
Publisher: Agamoday Samiti

Page 32

Having briefly stated the principal articles of Jain belief, I come to the great questions, the answers to which are the objects of all religious inquiry and the substance of all creeds.
What is the origin of the Universe ? This involves the question of God. Gautama, the Buddha, forbids inquiry into the beginning of things. In the Brahmanical literature bearing on the constitution of cosmos frequent reference is made to the days and nights of Brahma, the periods of Manuantara and the periods of Pralaya. But the Jains, leaving all symbolical expression aside distinctly reaffirm the view previously promulgated by the previous hierophants, that matter and soul are eternal and cannot be created. You can affirm existence of a thing from one point of view, deny it from another and affirm both existence and non-existence with reference to it at different times. If you should think of affirming both existence and non-existence at the same time from the same point of view, you must say that the thing cannot be spoken of similarly. Under certain circumstances the affirmation of existence is not possible, of non-existence and also of both.
What is meant by these seven modes is that a thing should not be considered as existing everywhere at all times, in all ways, and in the form of everything. It may exist in one place and not in another at one time. It is not meant by these modes that