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THE JAINA GAZETTE which they had collected so busily and industriously. For the same reason he avoided eggs. In food and clothing he lived as true world.despiser. “My garments are of (undyed) wool, neither green nor yellow, nor reddish brown." Only wooden shoes he wears, for those made of leather are acquired by bad practices, because it is a sin to kill animals to use their skins. In another place he recommends total nakedness when he says : "Summer gives you a complete garment." How strictly he followed the law of the Ahimsa is made clear by his saying :" It is better to let a flea live than to give a beggar a dirhem."
This predilection for nakedness, the forbearance towards vermin, the vegetarianism, above all the warning against the eating of honey, show the influence of Jainism, especially of the Digambaras. That a great commercial centre like Bagdad, where Adu-l-Ala spent most of his life, was visited by Jaina merchants is easily credible, and that the poet came into touch with them: It is seen from his writings that Abu-l-Ala had knowledge of many Indian customs. He mentions the habit of Indian ascetics not to cut their nails. He commends the custom of burning the dead, when he says: Behold, how the Indian burn their dead; that is better than long torments. If I am burned, then one needs not trouble about the hyenas, that crawl at night towards the corpse, and is safe from maltreatment and desecration. Fire is better than camphor, with which we bestrew the dead and better takes away the evil smells. Abu-l-Ala admired the Indian ascetics, who flung themselves into burning funeral piles. This way of attaining death is regarded by the Jainas as a "usual silly sort of asceticism" committed by heretics, whilst the intentional beath by hunger is praised. The saying of Abu-l-Ala's that he would like to forego all nourishment, if he could, lets us suppose that he had knowledge also of the “Samlekhana," but was too weak to follow it. According to all I have said it is possible that Abu-l-Ala has been in touch with Jainas and has partly adopted their ethical ideas. His metaphysical conceptions, however, on which his poems are based, show that he cannot have had closer relations with Jainism, which is shown
by his not-believing in the transmigration of souls." Shree Sudharmaswami Gyanbhandar-Umara, Surat
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