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Jaina View of Life
passions.66 Full practice of virtues would not be possible, because there is the possibility of the influence of passions.
In the next stage, the moral effort takes a more definite shape, although it is not always successful. A person has a more or less steady glimpse of the truth; and he tries to develop self-control and the obstacles to the practice of virtues are overcome in the sixth stage. But even here, the moral life and the spiritual struggle are not fully successful, because their full expression is vitiated by moral and spiritual inertia. This inertia is called pramada. And prāmada is overcome in the seventh stage of apramatta-samyata. Efforts to reach moral excellence take definite shape. The operation of Karma preventing perfect conduct is very feeble; and minor passions called kaşāyas are also subdued. We can now practise the five great vows and the twenty-four virtues. The process of adhavprahrtti-karana, by which the soul on a lower level can rise higher, begins to operate in this stage.66
The eighth stage is called apūrvakarana. It leads to greater and more definite self-control. The self attains special purification and is capable of reducing the intensity and duration of Karma. The Gommațasāra gives a detailed description of the process of apūrvakarana operating in this stage. In this stage, one is affected only by the mild affective states. It is possible to develop a stoic attitude. In the stages of development called anivșiti-bādarasamparāya, it is possible to overcome even the milder emotional disturbances with greater confidence and ease. We have, here, established ourselves as moral and spiritual individuals, although sometimes slight emotional afflictions are possible. In the tenth stage of sūkşmasamparāya, only greed disturbs us, and that too slightly. Except for this disturbance, one is passionless and clam. This subtle greed can be interpreted as the subconscious attachment to the body even
55. Gommațasära-Jī vakanda, 30 and Commentary, 56. Įbid. 48, 49,
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