Jaina Mysticism and Other Essays

Author(s): Kamalchand Sogani
Publisher: Prakrit Bharti Academy

Page 29

their body. 58 This is known as kevalī-maraņa, which requires our paramount devotedness. It is here that the inevitability of death has been properly met with.
Lastly, the realization of perfect ahimsā is deemed to be the religious goal. Ahiṁsā is so central in the Jaina faith that it may be called the beginning and the end of Jaina religion. All living beings from the one-sensed to the five sensed are basically like our own self.39 Consequently, it is not justifiable to injure them, to rule over them and to torment them." In fact, ahiṁsā represents adequate behaviour towards all living beings. 4! It is the essence of wisdom and the eternal religion.42 Samantabhadra says that ahiṁsā of all living beings is equivalent to the realization of the highest self.43 The truth is that to be violent to other beings is to be violent to one's self.44 It is, therefore, said that one should keep an attitude of friendship towards all living beings. The, Ācārānga-sūtra pronounces that one should neither deprive any living being of life, nor rule over him, nor torment him, nor excite him.45 If one proceeds to translate perfect ahiṁsā into practice, one cannot stop short of spiritual realization. It may be noted that the basic factors in any form of himsā are attachment (rāga) and hatred (dveșa), and these two continue to be operative in the mundane form of existence in different degrees. They can be overcome only when the empirical self arrives at the acme of spiritual experience. It is here that perfect ahiṁsā is conceivable, and below that only degrees of ahiṁsā are possible, hence perfect ahiṁsā is rightly the religious goal to be achieved.
2 (iii). Doctrine of Karma : We have said above that every jīva is potentially siddha, and the religious goal consists in realizing siddhahood which is the same as the state of paramātman, svasamaya, kevalī-maraṇa and ahiṁsā. This means that the goal is not something situated in a distant land, but it is the self in its veritable, dignified and ontological nature. In spite of this basic oneness of nature, the empirical selves differ from one another in respect of knowledge, prosperity, status, bodily make up, etc. What is the cause of this difference? How to account for these perceptible distinctions among empirical selves?
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