Jain Shwetambar Conference Herald 1916 Book 12

Author(s): Mohanlal Dalichand Desai
Publisher: Jain Shwetambar Conference

Page 214

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most primitive one; not only was it entertained by the anci. ents, but also it underlies the universal belief of transforma. tion occurring in the natural course of things or produced by sorcery and spells. This is a point I wish to make, that the Sankhyas and Jainas started from the same concepsion of matter, but worked it out on different lines. The Sankh yas teach that the products of Brakrti are evolved in a fred order, from the most subtle air! spiritual one (Buddhi) down to the gross elements, and this order is always reproduced in the successive creations dissolutions of the world. The Jainas, on the other han, do not admit such order of development of matt pudgala ), but believe hat the universe is eternal and of a permanent structure. Accor. ding to them matter is atomie, and all material changes are really going on in the atoms and their combinations. A curious feature of their atomic theory is that the atoms are eicher in a gross condition or in a shile one, and that innumerable subtle atoms take up the space of one gross atom. The learing of this theory on their richology I shall now pro :eed to point out. But 1 must pre in that the Jainas, do no7 re. cognize a psychical apparatus such a complex nature as the Sankhyas in their tenet cerning Buddhi, Ahamkara, Manas, and the Indriyas. The Jaina opinion is n uch cruder, and comes briefly to this. According to the merit or demerit of a person, atoms of a peculiar subtle form, which we will call karma na ter, invade his soul or iva, filling and defiling it, and obstinating its innate faculties. The Jainas are quite outspoken on this point, and explicitly say that karman is made up of m er-paudgalikam karma. This must be understood literally, ot as a metaphor, as will be seen from the following illust'ations. The soul or jiva is extremely light, and by itself ita tendency to move upwards (urdhvagaurava ), but it is kit down by the karma mutter with which it is filled. But when it is entirely purged of karma matter, at Nirvana, it go upwards in a straight lipa to the top of the universe, the donicile of the released svuls.