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74
Jaina Acara : Siddhanta aura Swarupa
Your attempt should be to minimise your needs, lead a simple life and not be tempted by others' splendour and magnificence. The causes of theft are many such as, craving, starvation, unemployment, being a spendthrift, yearning for status and fame and, to top it all, one's own nature. Bad company and want of education are contributory factors. The kinds of gross theft have already been dealt with.
Following are the transgressions of the vow of non-stealing:
(i) A householder does not steal but purchases some stolen property, taking it to be his right. When some article is sold at very cheap rates, he should forthwith suspect some fly in the ointment. Granted that a man in dire need of money may sell his property cheap but there is a marked difference between the purchase and market price. The man with stolen property acts in fear, trying to conceal things, which the other need not. To possess stolen property and to give shelter to thieves and robbers are a punishable offence. This is called 'Stenährta.
(ii) The second transgression is ‘Taskaraprayoga', i.e. to encourage and praise thieves. A lawyer who, knowing his client to be a thief, helps him for his fees. All such activities are transgressions.
(iii) Viruddharājyātikrama, i.e. indulgence in illegal export and import business between two inimical countries. Smuggling and spying also come under this head.
(iv) Kutatulā-kūtamāpa, i.e. to cheat customers by weighing less as also craftiness in measuring cloth. Giving short weight and making use of tricks of the trade is transgression, obviously immoral and when exposed, indubitably illegal.
(v) Tatpratirūpakvyavahara, i.e. to adulterate as small pieces of stone in wheat, seeds of papaya in pepper, sand in cumin seeds, vegetable ghee in the pure one, water in milk and the like. Adulteration defames a country. Should businessmen abjure it, the country can progress industrially by leaps and bounds.
4. Svadārasantoşavrata, i.e. satisfaction with one's own wife without any sexual craving for other women. Celibacy is a great force and potential aid to self-realization. Even Indra, the king of gods, bows his head at the feet of the victor of sense-organs. It is simply impossible for a householder to abstain from sex altogether. He should only try to set some limt to it. The wife and the husband should co-operate with each other for the spiritual development of both. The householder vows not to have sex with other women nor encourage or support it in any manner. All other women are his mothers and sisters for whom there should be no passion. He cannot afford to be licentious. To live a restrained life he must avoid
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