________________
Jainism: The Cosmic Vision they die. To avoid injury to them, as far as possible, man is advised to use them discreetly. He should desist from polluting water, air, etc. thereby perpetrating violence to them. Worms, insects, animals, etc. help in keeping ecological balance thus they help man. And for ages domestic animals have been a constant and faithful aid to man in civilizing himself. From the ultimate standpoint of their original pure pristine state, all living beings are uniform in their nature. Jainism teaches to look upon them as upon one's own self. Inflicting injury to them is inflicting injury to one's ownself.
Jain religion, which puts maximum emphasis on Ahimsa i.e, non-violence, strongly advocates compassion towards animals. Let us first try to understand the approach of the Jain religion towards animals and other living beings. The Jain religion believes that animals, too, have souls and it respects animals, as much as, it shows respect to human beings. Not only that, but it believes that man and animals both possess equal potential to achieve salvation. That is why the dictum of the Jain religion is : ftaret Sport - "the killing of an animal is equivalent to killing of the ownself."
The sixteenth Tirthankara, Shri Shantinath Bhagwan, set an excellent example of balancing the rights of various animals in the kingdom of nature. Once he was caught in the middle of a dilemma. A pigeon came rushing to him for shelter, trying to save its life from a hawk. The hawk swooped down on the pigeon, to feed herself and her hungry family. What would Shri Shantinath Bhagwan do? If he saves the pigeon, the hawk dies of hunger. If he feeds the hawk, the pigeon dies. He did not
Compassion Touards Animals want either of them to suffer. So he found a solution by offering the sacrifice of his own flesh to the hawk, so neither hawk nor the pigeon would have to die. Jainism opened a line of thought which will have to grapple with such tricky problems.
The Jain religion prescribes a religious ritual called Pratikraman. As a part of this ritual, one has to seek forebearance or pardon for all the sins one may have committed. Among the daily rituals that every Jain man and woman has to practice or observe, one of them also includes the vow to avoid confining animals in cages, harming them with weapons, cutting down or piercing the parts of their body, inflincting unbearable physical burden on them and depriving them of food and water. Similarly, the first and the foremost of the vows of the Jain religion called Anuvrata and Mahavrata includes compassion towards all living beings, including animals. This is followed by the exhortation to show kindness and pity to animals and not to practice any type of cruelty towards them. The Jains consider this to be the true religion. The Jain scripture Bodhpahud states that true religion exists only where mercy towards all is practised.
This is distinctly noticeable in the life of the 23rd Tirthankara Neminath. While he was on way going to marry a beautiful woman called Rajimati, he heard the shricks of cattle which were confined in cattle-enclosure. He enquired from the chariot driver as so why so many cattle have been confined in the enclosure. The chariot driver told Neminath that they are to be slaughtered for the feast that has been organised to celebrate your wedding. This shocked Neminath who never
so
