Jain Spirit 2001 12 No 09

Author(s): Jain Spirit UK
Publisher: UK Young Jains

Page 29

MICHAEL FREEMAN GANGES AT VARANASI, INDIA
PRACTISE BEFORE
YOU PREACH
N.P. Jain passionately explains the global significance of ahimsa in modern life
ESPITE
AND
SCIENCE ASTOUNDING ADVANCES IN technology, knowledge communications and comfort
A river does not drink its own water. It gives unconditionally
violence-prone, terrorism-targeted, hate-infested and intolerance-glorified world moving towards rapid erosion of moral values, merciless degradation of the environment and evaporation of soul-energy. Man's exploitative instincts against man, nature and other living beings have brought the universe to the brink of disaster. Dogmas, rituals, bigotry, orthodoxy and fanaticism have come to be mistaken as religion and we have gone a long way towards committing spiritual hara-kiri.
At this time of the crisis of the human spirit Mahavir's ever-abiding teachings assume contemporary relevance for today and tomorrow for all humanity, transforming barriers of
Practise Before You Preach
Mahavir's unique contribution was to articulate with much greater clarity, comprehension and thrust an all-comprehensive and wider ranging definition of ahimsa (non-violence) - raising it Ahimsa Parmo to the pedestal of "supreme religion" Dharma. Behind this enlarged and integrated vision of ahimsa was the spiritual urge to transform into life ethics the concepts of "live and let live" and the oneness of all creation. Mahavir elucidated the principles of Jainism in their most fundamental and encompassing compassionate parameters. He observed: "There is nothing so small and subtle as the atom nor any element so vast as space. Similarly, there is no quality of soul more subtle than non-violence and no virtue of spirit greater than reverence of life."
caste, creed, colour, sex or region. Mahavir first practised and then preached. Born in a royal family surrounded by limitless trappings of luxuries, his life path was charted out to rule and dominate. Despite this, he chose to renounce the kingdom of power, desires and ego to seek the keys of the true kingdom of life where compassion and tolerance, renunciation and non-possession, relativity of thinking and action, non-attachment and non-violence became the tools to shape inter-humanity dealings as well as the approach of co-existence and co-prosperity with the natural environment and other life forms.
Humans the most superior living beings on earth - need to awaken to the realisation that they have an obligation to fight for life on earth not just for themselves
December 2001- February 2002 Jain Spirit 25