Jain Spirit 2001 12 No 09

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

Page 60

PHILOSOPHY
LOKA - THE JAIN UNIVERSE
Paul Dundas analyses the theory of the universe as presented in Jain scriptures
56
TO
angoloed Main me
Goo
HE VAST BUT FINITE UNIVERSE IN WHICH ACTION, REBIRTH
and the attainment of enlightenment take place and under whose roof the delivered souls find their final abode is called the loka (world) or sometimes the triloka (triple world). Although loka meant originally "open space", Jain teachers generally preferred to derive it from the verbal root lok (see) and explain the term as "that which is seen by the omniscient ones" or "that which is seen by the soul". The loka is both a shorthand designation for the five basic ontological categories of the souls, motion, rest, atomic matter and space, which permeate the universe and, in its more usual concrete sense, the massive structure which contains the heavens and the hells, along with the system of island continents divided by mountain ranges and surrounded by oceans lying at its centre. Outside the loka there is only the non-loka (aloka) where there is nothing except strong winds.
The loka is without beginning or end in time and was not brought into existence through the agency of any divine being. To this extent, Jainism is an atheistic religion. It regards it an illegitimate conclusion that there is a conscious creator who can control or intervene in the affairs of living creatures. Such a being would have to be either without a body, in which case a locus for the intention and effort of creation would be lacking, or if embodied unable to fulfil the necessary requirement of being all-pervading since in this case the ontological categories would not find any room in the loka. Alternatively, if nonpervading, such a god would have to be an entity possessing
Paul Dundas
Jain Spirit December 2001 February 2002
component parts and thus non-eternal. For the Jains deities such as Brahma and Vishnu, whom Hindus credit with a creative role in the universe, are themselves subject to the process of rebirth in the same manner as all other embodied souls in the loka.
Early Jain cosmography as found in the Shvetambara scriptures provides only sketchy information about the dimensions of the loka. Totally absent is any reference to the "rope" (rajju), which is the distance travelled by a god flying for six months at a speed of ten million miles a second. Nor is there any mention of the lokapurusha, a universe in the shape of a giant man (purusha) measuring fourteen ropes from head to foot, which is frequently depicted in Jain art from about the 16th century onwards. However, the classical delineation of the loka is recognisable in a passage in the "Exposition of Explanations" where it is said to be expanded at the bottom, narrow in the middle and broad in its upper dimensions. Described in works of fantastic mensural complexity dating from the early centuries of the common era onwards and portrayed in paintings of often striking colour and imagination, the loka represents the arena in which rebirth takes place and where, as Hemachandra puts it, all living creatures, Brahman or untouchable, Brahma or worm, are actors in the play called transmigration and the manifold types of existence are as temporary and uncertain as living.
The central strip of the loka, the Middle World, represents its smallest area, being only one rope wide and one hundred thousand leagues high. It is of the greatest significance since it is inhabited by human beings, the only creatures who can attain enlightenment in the course of their lives. The Middle World consists of a system of alternating oceans and continents with the central continent of Jambudvipa, "The Island of the Roseapple Tree". With the adjacent continent of Dhatakikhanda and half of the continent nearest to it, Pushkaradvipa, it forms the abode of mankind. Within Jambudvipa there are a series of regions bordered by mountain ranges and rivers, of which Bharata (that is India), Airavata and Mahavideha are karmabhumi where fordmakers are preaching at this very moment.
Below the Middle World is a series of hells, each