Jainism a Theistic Philosophy

Author(s): Krishna A Gosavi
Publisher: Parshwanath Vidyapith

Page 83

JAINA THEISM AND CONCEPT OF SOUL
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Liberated and mundane (Siddha and Saṁsārī) Born in hell (Nārakī), Lower animal (Tiryaka), Human Being (Manusya) and Spirits, gods and demons (Devatā) Hell-being male lower animals, female lower animals, male human beings, female human being, male demigods and female demigods. The five sub-divisions of one, two, three, four and five sensed jīvas.
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Living Matter (sacitta) and Lifeless Matter (acitta): The division of living matter (sacitta) and lifeless matter (acitta), according to Jainism, is a noteworthy in this connection. As long as a piece of rock has the vitalities and possesses the capacity of growing, it comes under the category of immobile organism. But when this rock is taken out, it loses all vitalities together with its capacity of growing, coming in contact with dissimilar objects, such as water, air, etc. It is then called acitta and it possesses no more a soul. The same is the case with water-bodied, fire-bodied, and plant-bodied soul. To take another example, water is a living-matter according to Jaina biology, but when it is taken out of the well and heated, it loses all the characteristic of a jīva. Similarly, a fruit, as long as it is green, is a living-matter, but it becomes dead matter or ajīva when it is ripe. Thus, it is very clear that Jainism is not animist in the sense that “everything is possessed of soul,"27 but on the other hand it makes a clear distinction between soul and non-soul.
As regards life in vegetable kingdom, Jainism holds a very important view. "Though some other Indian philosophers admit that the plants possess souls, the Jaina thinkers have developed this theory in remarkable way.” Jainism holds that the plants may be the body of one soul (pratyeka) or it may possess a multitude of embodied souls (sādhāraṇa). In former case, the plants are always gross, while in latter the being are very subtle and invisible and they possess a common body and have their respiration and nourishment in common, but are otherwise separate and distinct from each other.