Jainism Eternal and Universal Path for Enlightenment

Author(s): Narendra Bhandari
Publisher: Research Institute of Scientific Secrets from Indian Oriental Scriptures Ahmedabad

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Jainism: The Eternal and Universal path for Enlightenment
not be a direct consequence of their actions in the current life but may be cumulative consequence of karmas in the previous and current lives. Transmigration from one body to another is one of the corollaries of this postulate.
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Rebirth allows one to expand one's life beyond one life span and continuity in his pursuit of enlightenment, so even after death, there is hope of attaining any goal one chooses. Case histories of rebirth abound, but most of them are subjective, and rigorous, acceptable scientific proofs are not readily available. Logically there is no difficulty in accepting rebirth since if one can be born once, he can be born again and again, when the conditions are appropriate. Laws of physics allow the same process to re-occur under similar conditions.
In Jainism, much thought has been given to the process of birth. Apart from the usual processes of sexual and asexual births through conception (from eggs and from womb), pollination etc, Jainism postulates that some divine beings are born by some uncommon, non-natural, asexual process, as has been the case with Christ, the son of God, who was born to Mary the Virgin, Rama (and his brothers) who were born by Yagna, Karna and some Pandavas who were conceived by Kunti from Sun God and Mah1vira, whose fetus was transferred from the womb of Devananda, wife of a brahmin Rishabdatta to the Queen Trishala. Buddhism also claims the "appearance" of Padma Sambhav from a lotus in a lake in Copper mountains.
Modern biology has made tremendous progress in the past few decades, with techniques of molecular biology, genetic engineering and determination of genome sequence in different species. It has been established that physical and mental conditions or health of a living being depends on genome sequence with which one is born, a concept close to karma concept of Jainism. There is much scope for research in biology keeping in view the various Jain concepts and equally importantly for confirmation of Jain concepts using modem experimental and analytical techniques. If Jain concepts can be rigorously formulated, and if found true, the techniques of modern molecular biology can hopefully clarify many of them, and provide rigorous scientific basis. For example a question arises whether the Karman sharira decides the genome or the DNA sequence. Furthermore do the various procedures of s'dhana (Tapas, mantras and meditation or adherence to the five Mah1vrats, discussed in Chapter 6) can modify the genome sequence in long run? The relation between parmanu and karm1nu, the influence of karm1nu on genome and whether karm1nus operate on