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CHAPTER 6
THE WORKING MODEL
1. INTRODUCTION Jainism, being mainly concerned with the spiritual progress of the soul, naturally devoted more attention to the questions relating to the soul in all its aspects. According to Jainism, the utmost care of the soul must be taken by every body because it is firmly believed that the soul is in contact with the matter (i. e. Karma ) from the time immemorial and unless the soul is completely freed from the Karmic matter, it will not obtain its natural position. In its natural condition the soul possesses the four important attributes of infinite perception, infinite knowledge, infinite happiness and infinite power. To obtain this position is the aim of every true Jaina and it is the primary duty of Jainism to show clearly the way to achieve that position. The main burden of Jaina litera ture is to delineate the path of salvation in unambiguous terms so that anybody can follow the path with full conviction about its ultimate success. Since an enormous amount of emphasis was · laid on the question of the liberation of soul, it is but natural that the Jaina literature concentrated its attention more on this problem than on any other. If we casually notice the vast amount of secular and sacred Jaina literature, it will be manifest that the Jaina writers have, throughout these centuries, portrayed the philosophical side of their life very prominently as compared with the other sides. In the domain of serious literature the Jaina writers have produced far too many treatises upon the philosophical beliefs of their religion and hardly any good ones on its sociological and cultural aspects. Whenever Jaina writers felt persuaded to write on non-philosophical subjects, they turned to traditional and learned pursuits like the writing of books on grammar, prosody,
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