Jaina Path of Ahimsa

Author(s): Vilas Sangve
Publisher: Bhagwan Mahavir Research Centre

Page 26

Moksha-mārga According To Jainism
13
being. In short, right faith is given precedence over right knowledge and conduct, because it acts as a pilot in guiding the soul towards Moksha.
II. Right Knowledge :
On attaining right belief it is considered desirable to strive after right knowledge. Although right belief and right knowledge are contemporaneous there is yet a clear relation of cause and effect between them, just as there is between a lamp and its light. Right knowledge is that which reveals the nature of things neither insufficiently, nor with exaggeration nor falsely, but exactly as it is and that too with certainty. Such knowledge must be free from doubt, perversity and vagueness. Jainism also insists that right knowledge cannot be attained, unless belief of any kind in its opposite, that is, in wrong knowledge is banished. Further, like right belief, right knowledge also has got eight Angas, i.e. pillars or requirements which support the right knowledge.
III. Right Conduct:
Right conduct includes the rules of discipline which restrain all censurable movements of speech, body and mind, weaken and destroy all passionate activity and lead to non-attachment and purity. Right conduct presupposes the presence of right knowledge which presupposes the existence of right belief. Therefore, it is enjoined upon the persons who have secured right belief and right knowledge to observe the rules of right conduct as the destruction of Karmic matter can be accomplished only through the right conduct.
Further, Samyak Chāritra, i. e., right conduct is divided into two kinds, viz., Sakala Chāritra, i. e., perfect or unqualified conduct, and Vikala Chāritra, i. e., imperfect or qualified conduct, and of these two kinds the unqualified is observed by ascetics who have renounced worldly ties and the qualified by laymen still entangled in the world.
Obviously Jainism attaches great importance to actual observance of the ethical code or the rules of conduct prescribed both for the ascetics and the householders with a view to attaining their ultimate objective in life, i. e,. Moksha.