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Jaina Perspective in Philosophy and Religion
by perceiving only a part of it. This is how Virasena Swami reasons. Samantabhadra, an early Jaina Logician has tried to prove the existence of Omniscience though the reasoning based on the capability of being known through inference. Dharmabhūşapa explaining this says that perception does not mean 'actual perception' but also 'object of knowledge'. Shri Sukhalaljí Sanghavi, perhaps the most erudite living Jaina Scholar, says that the origin of all the above varieties of proofs for the existence of Omniscience can be traced back to the Yoga-Sūtra of Patañjali, especially the Sūtra which deals with Omniscience? Let us conclude with the author of Āpta-parikșa : “When Omiscience is proved by all the six traditional sources of knowledge, it is establised beyond all doubt.” The concept of Omniscience is perfectly consistent with the Jaina concept of soul as the possessor of infinite knowledge which is veild due to various reasons as stated elsewhere in this paper.
(4) Karma and Rebirth If the culmination of knowledge lies in Omniscience, the final consumation of spiritutal life consists in the attainment of emancipation or better self-realisation. It may be possible that owing to various limitations, the final salvation may not be possible during the present life time and hence we require a number of births for its realisation. This is the metaphysics of rebirth. Rebirth is the inseparable twin of Karma. But if rebirth is a fact, the idea of pre-birth also cannot be rejected. The present is the result of the past and cause of the future. As every event must have a cause so every cause must have its effects. This is the Law of Karma, the Ultimate Law of the Universe with adjusts effect to cause on the physical, moral and spiritual planes of being. This is the Law of the Conservation of Moral Energy or the Moral Law of Equilibrium operating in an undeviating and unerring manner like
1. Patañjali : Yoga-Sūtra (Ed. & English trans. by J. H.
Woods ), Cambridge, 1914.
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