Book Title: Jaina Philosophy
Author(s): Virchand R Gandhi, Kumarpal Desai
Publisher: World Jain Confederation

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Page 243
________________ - The Jaina Philosophy borne down by superior brute force. They remind us of Archimedes imploring the cruel invader not to disturb his philosophical circles, but there was no help for them. That ideal of human life which they had pictured to themselves and which to a certain extent they seemed to have realized before they were discovered and disturbed by the 'outer barbarians' had to be surrendered. It was not to be. The whole world was to be a fighting and a huckstering world, and even the solution of the highest problems of religion and philosophy was in future to be determined, not by sweet reasonableness, but by the biggest battalions. We must all learn that lesson, but even to the hardened historian it is a sad lesson to learn." Such, has been the case of the people of India from earliest times. Our physical resistance in every instance has been spasmodic under the goading of injustice, for the reason that in our philosophy and religion there is no curriculum nor science of war, only the holy breathings of lessons and principles that make for peace and brotherhood. Cruelty and reprisals have been charged upon us, which charge we do not fully deny, since the worm will turn under the remorseless tread of the ruthless invader; but even in the paroxysm of such madness, overborne by greater power and cruelty and in the agonies of undeserved death and extermination, we still clung to the prayer of our holy faith. "We forgive all living beings. We ask all living beings to forgive us." To my American Christian brothers and sisters who are before me and through them to the whole of Christendom, I have to say a few words. Thave learned since coming to thins country that the great shibboleth of the host of Christendom is, “The whole world for Christ.” What is that? What do you mean? Who is that Christ in whose name you propose to conquer the world? Is there a Christ of oppression? Is there a Christ of injustice? Is there a Christ of Jain Education International For Personal & Private Use Only www.jainelibrary.org

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