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JATSISM AND WORLD PROBLEMS
and dependent only on Himself. Passions like anger and greed do not move a God ; He is not subject to grief and sorrow.
The Jaina conception of God does not adinit of an offering. Divinity in Jainism is compatible only with ahimsa (Universal Love) ; and will not, in any way, become associated with, or a party to, the shedding of the blood of the least or the lowest of living beings in ritualistic ceremonies.
A God should have no private loves or hatreds to sway or disturb or upset His inner tranquillity and repose ; He is impervious alike to praise and abuse. Divinity is free from hunger, thirst, afflicting sensations, such as heat and cold, from which the spirits (souls) in physical bodies suffer. Sex function has no place in the life of a God; Spirit is neither male nor female, though unemancipated spirits appear with sex distinction, owing to the association with the physical body, which is characterised by the generative function. All impure spirits inay attain to a Divine Status, as many have done in the past, and many will do in the future. All Spirits are alike in respect of their natural attributes and qualities, so that when they are purified, no difference remains to distinguish one of them from the others. All are alike, of the same substance, and endowed with like attributes ; none amongst the Gods is greater, none less or lesser than any other. Apart froin pure, perfect Spirit there are and can be no other gods.
The Deity, in the Jaina doctrine, is the highest Ideal that is kept before the mind, with the object of ultimately becoining like Him. “Be ye therefore perfect even as your Father in heaven is perfect."
If any one thinks that there is not enough work for Divinity to do in the above, or be dissatisfied with the description for any other cause, the reply is that Nature offers immortality only on these terms. None who rejects them can escape death and repeated deaths and perpetual misery in transmigration.
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