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Jaina View of Life
We have, so far, seen that the Jainas, as also the Buddhists, were against the theistic conception of God. God as a creator is not necessary to explain the universe. We have not to seek God there in the world outside, nor is God to be found in the dark lonely corner of a temple with doors all shut'. He is there within us. He is there with the tiller tilling the ground and the "pathmaker breaking stones', in the sense that each individual soul is to be considered as God, as he is essentially divine in nature. Each soul when it is perfect is god.
3. The Jainas sought the divine in man and established the essential divinity of man. This conception has been developed in specific directions in Jaina philosophy.
As we have seen, the existence of the soul is a presupposition in the Jaina philosophy. Proofs are not necessary. If there are any proofs we can say that all the pramānas can establish the existence of the soul. It is described from the phenomenal and the noumenal points of view. From the phenomenal point of view, it possesses prāņas, is the lord (prabhu), doer (karta), enjoyer (bhokta), limited to his body (dehamā tra), still incorporeal and is ordinarily found with Karma, From the noumenal point of view, soul is described in its pure form. It is pure and perfect. It is pure consciousness. It is unbound, untouched and no other than itself. The joys and sorrows that the soul experiences are due to the fruits of Karma which it accumulates due to the continuous activity that it is having. This entanglement is beginningless, but it has an end. The deliverance of the soul from the wheel of samsāra is possible by voluntary means. By the moral and spiritual efforts involving samvara and nirjarā, the Karma accumulated in the soul is removed. When all Karma is removed, the soul becomes pure and perfect, free from the wheel of Saṁsāra. Being free, with its upward motion it attains liberation or
8. Ibid, 9. Pancasrikayasāra. 27 & Samayasara, 124.
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