Jaina Mysticism and Other Essays

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

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outward expression. In siddhas there is only the devatva. This does not imply the belittlement of the siddha, but simply the glorification of arhat as the supreme guru, gurutva being his additional characteristic.
3. MORALS
As we have said, the performance of spiritual exercises presupposes the practice of morals. Without moral observances spiritual progress is inconceivable. The conviction of the Jaina is that for the man who is spiritually awakened, morality serves. as a means to spiritual living, but for the ordinary man, it is an end in itself. The realm of morality is auspicious psychical states resulting in auspicious activities. The obstacles to the achievement of morals are inauspicious activities emanating from inauspicious psychical states. Thus in order to stamp out the inauspicious psysical states from the texture of self the individual must abstain himself root and branch from violence, falsehood, theft, unchastity and acquisitions. This negative process of purifying the self necessarily requires the pursuance of the positive process of non-violence (ahiṁsā), truthfulness (satya), non-thieving (asteya), chastity (brahmacarya) and nonacquisition (aparigraha). These five virtues replace the five vices. It may be noted here that ahiṁsā is the central and fundamental of these virtues. All the rest are regarded as the means for its proper sustenance, just as the field of corn requires adequate fencing for its protection.84 When the replacement of vices by virtues is total, we are said to observce complete morality (sakala) and when it is partial, we have partial morality (vikala). He who observes complete morality is called a muni. while he who observes partial morality is called a householder. The life of aņuvratas represents partial morality of the householder, whereas the life of mahāvratas represents complete morality of the muni. The aņuvratas and the mahāvratas are the. ways of overcoming the vices of hiṁsā, steya, asatya, abrahmacarya and parigraha. Let us deal with the nature of these vices which will help us in deriving the scope of aņuvratas and mahāvratas.
Jaina Mysticism and other essays
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