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Men and God
earliest recorded expressions in the Vedas. Mokşa as a release from the wheel of Samsara and its positive aspect as oneness with the Highest, was becoming gradually clear in the Upanisads. In the Chhandogya Upanisad, it is still not clear. The Brhadaranyaka Upanisad describes the release as freedom from death day or night of waxing and waning of the moon.20 In the later Upanisads like the Maitrayani we find new ideas 'jolting against old ones'."1
It is therefore possible to say that the conception of mokşa or release from the bonds of empirical life is primarily pre Āryan. It was prevalent in India before the Aryans settled here. Indian philosophy is the synthesis of two currents of thoughtthe Aryan and the pre-Aryan. The Jaina and the Buddhist thoughts were original and pre-Aryan. They were assimilated in the subsequent Hindu philosophy through the Upanisads. The Dravidian contribution to the development of Indian philosophy was no less important. The influence of forest life, the emergence of female gods and the conception of Avatāra were largely due to the Dravidian influence.** And so was the conception of Mokşa brought from the pre-Aryan thought and developed in the Upanisads and subsequent philosophy.
Jaina religion is very ancient and pre-Aryan. It prevailed even before Parsva and Vardhamana, the last two Tirthankaras. The Yajurveda mentions Rşabha, Ajita and Arişţanemi as Tirthankaras. Jainism reflects the cosmology and anthropology of a much older pre-Aryan upper class of North-Eastern India.28 Jacobi has traced Jainism to early primitive current of metaphysical speculation."
20. Brhadaranyaka Upanisads, III, i, 3.
21. Encyclopedia of Religion and Ethics, Vol. 8, p. 770.
22. History of Philosophy (Eastern); edt. Radhakrishnan. Ch. I. 23. Zimmer (H.): Philosophies of India. Vol. I, p. 287. 24. Jacobi (Hermann): Studies in Jainism.
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