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THE JAINA GAZETTE of the vitalities (pranas) of a living being through anger, pride, deceit, or greed is defined as Himsa. Prana is said to be that which shows the existence of life in a body. The five senses, the three forces of mind, speech and body, respiration and duration of life, are said to be the ten pranas. Man has all the ten pranas. But plants have only four pranas, viz., the sense of touch, the force of body, respiration and duration of life. The number of pranas increases according to the number of senses possesed by a living being. Worldly souls are either immobile. or mobile. The immobile beings are the earth-bodied, firebodied, water bodied, air-bodied, and plants, trees, etc. These have only one sense, viz., the sense of touch. They cannot move from one place to another of their own accord. The mobile beings are those that can move from one place to another and they have two senses or more. For example worms, ants, bees and men have two, three, four, and five senses respectively. To kill a one-sensed being is lesser himsa than to kill a twosensed being. Similarly the volume of sin increases in proportion to the number of the senses possessed by the being put to death. A layman is ordained not to kill anything except plants and vegetables and an ascetic should on no account kill any kind of life, vegetable or non-vegetable.
Himsa is said to be of four kinds, intentional himsa, himsa done to protect oneself, himsa committed in the discharge of our daily duties, and himsa caused during the conduct of one's business. Of these four the layman should abstain from the first kind of Himsa at all costs. The ascetic should be free from all.
Four Main Essentials. A person who desires to practise Ahimsa should in the first place cultivate in himself, friendliness for all the living beings, delight at the sight of the learned and the more advanced in spiritual life, mercy for the afflicted, and tolerance towards those who are perversely inclined.
He should also abstain from acts which are causes of Himsa for instance flesh-eating, hunting, killing animals and birds for
the sake of their skins and feathers, killing insects and birds and Shree Sudharmaswami Gyanbhandar-Umara, Surat
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