Jaina Political Thought

Author(s): G C Pandey
Publisher: Prakrit Bharti Academy

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householder. Both accepted the notion of an ideal, universal ruler who was conceived differently than in the Brahmanical tradition. Both maintained a strict distinction between the Universal Ruler and the enlightened teacher. It is true that the Buddhist tradition suggests at places that the universal Ruler does not rule by force but by righteousness alone. At the same time the difficulties of this idea were not entirely lost on them. They did realize that it would be virtually impossible to find any one who could rule by righteousness alone. Perhaps Buddha could but he would not agree to it. This, in effect, reduces the Buddhist idea to an impracticable ideal. The Jaina concept of the Universal Ruler, on the other hand, is that of a righteous person who commands sovereign force in the interest of righteousness, which does not have the same meaning for a householder as it has for a monk. The knowledge of anything in its absoluteness or infinity is attainable only in omniscience which does not have the same meaning for a householder as it has for a monk. For the rest we must recognize relativity. A ruler who has abandoned intentional violence is, thus, to be deemed righteous relative to one who has not done so but he will have to be considered unrighteous relative to a saint who has renounced all violent action. The theory of relativity has been essential toJainism and it made it possible for it to appreciate the specific character of political life without at the same time abandoning its commitment to non-violence as the supreme value.
One other difference must be noticed between Buddhist and Jaina thought. Jainism believes in Kriyavada while Buddhism tends to be ultimately Akiryavadin. For Buddhism there is an ultimate discontinuity between the world of action and the eternity of knowledge. Righteousness is, therefore, likearaft to be left behind when one crosses over to the other shore. This tends to make the world of action with its distinctions of right and wrong ultimately unreal. Such an attitude was unlikely to help the growth of a science of politics except in a negative sense of a plea for abandoning violence. Its gnostic tendency stood in the way of Buddhist moral consciousness formulating a detailed positive alternative to the socio-political systems it did not favour.The result was that in India as well as China where it had to contend with a well-entrenched social system, it tended to compromise or was edged out. Jainism, on the other hand, was realistic. It believed in the reality of action and its two poles, the self and the world. The power of action inhered in the soul and continued in it eternally. Reality is not only compatible with change, it requires change. Such a theory of a real and yet changeable world where souls are engaged in action cannot credit any finite aspect with absolute reality or unreality. I
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