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178
JAINISM: A THEISTIC PHILOSOPHY “GOD IN JAINISM”
heretofore alluded to, is that the variety that we see in the world is due to the effects of actions. Karma or actions alone is the cause of the conditions of happiness or sorrow of the various kinds of people inhabiting in India, all other countries, islands, and cold mountainous tracts. There is nothing else than karma. From experience too, karma is found to be the prime cause. depend upon men who being sentient are intelligent. It is therefore that actions being dependent upon rational beings gradually unfold their effects. If you say that your aim is to prove only a superintelligent God, and not ordinary intelligent beings, then your proposition is devoid of what is to be proved. The connection of God as a supervisor in regards to the action of an axe or a saw is not established but the connection of potter and others in regard to making pots etc. is established.
(10) Another question:
It is the men themselves who do right and wrong actions, but it is God who rewards or punishes for them. Men are in a position to enjoy the fruits of their actions themselves just as thieves who commit thefts themselves are not able to punish themselves for their nefarious deeds. It is another man who sends them to a prison.
Muniji answered:
This statement is also fallacious. When men are competent to do right or wrong actions, why are they not competent to enjoy their fruits themselves? Accordingly as a man does right or wrong, he becomes the cause of enjoying its fruits himself. A thief commits theft. The king punishes him or thief is affected by such unclean diseases as leprosy, ulceration etc., it is not often that such a man
"Muni Ātmärāmajī, “Chicago Praşnottara i.e. Questions & Answers on Jainism” for the Chicago Parliament of World Religions”, 1918 published by Shri Atmanand Pustak Pracharak Mandal, Roshan Mohalla, Agra. Q.No. 45, P-68
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