Jainism

Author(s): Annie Besant
Publisher: Theosophical Publishing House

Page 18

JAINISME
3
merchants and manufacturers — and we find them mostly gathered in Rajputana, in Gujarat, in Kathiawar;2 scattered indeed also in other parts, but the great Jaina communities may be said to be confined to these regions of India. Truly it was not so in the past, for we shall find presently that they spread, especially at the time of the Christian Era, as well as before it and after it, through the whole of Southern India; but if we take them as they are today, the provinces that I mentioned may be said practically to include the mass of the Jainas.
There is one point with regard to the castes which separates them from Hinduism. The Sannyasi of the Jaina may come from any caste. He is not restricted, as in ordinary orthodox Hinduism, to the Brahmana caste. The Yati may come from any of the castes, and of course as a rule comes from the Vaisya, that being the enormously predominating caste among the Jainas, • We will consider their way of looking at the world for a moment; and then we will
Now called Rajasthan. ? Now called Saurashtra.