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CHAPTER - I
INTRODUCTION
Invariably almost all Indian as well as European scholars of philosophy have quoted Jainism as an atheistic philosophy; even a few cited that Jainism does not believe in God, so it is an atheistic.
Some scholars even quoted that Jainas admit the existence of numerous gods; but in the Jaina philosophy the gods are one of the four sub-types of living beings (human, celestial, animal and hellish beings)'. The celestial beings are higher than the human beings.
Vedic Brahmins and priests created impression in popular minds that a set of suitable rituals and sacrifices have the magical power to please the gods or even supreme God to get the boons desired. The Vedic God conceived as cause of phenomenal universe or creator, sustainer and destroyer of countless living beings, is infinite, absolute, omnipresent, omnipotent and omniscient.
Jainism has no place for such a creator God, but the God of Jaina (Paramātmā) is a pure soul who has attained the state of Godhood only after getting itself freed from all karmas and attained perfect divinity. Jainas did not accept authority of Vedas, so Vedic Brahmins classified Jainism in heterodox school of Indian philosophy and called Jainism an atheist and nāstika.
The aim of this work is to explore that the Jainism is not an atheistic philosophy but it is a theistic one. It holds that classification of Jainism in Indian philosophy as a nāstika or its English translation, quite often, made as an atheistic is unjustified and misleading because Jainism is a very much theistic philosophy and religion if compared with all religions of the world.
Tattvārtha Sūtra, IV.1 Paramātma-prakāśa by Yogindudeva, 330
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