Jainism and World Problems

Author(s): Champat Rai Jain
Publisher: ZZZ Unknown

Page 26

18
JAINISM AND WORLD PROBLEMS
IDEALS FOR A NEW WORLD ORDER*
There is no doubt but that all is not well with the world and that it is not getting smoothly along to-day. Men are troubled with various kinds of forebodings about the future, and are anxious to find a remedy for their troubles. Many people are to-day looking up to religion to come to the aid of humanity.
And, no doubt, Religion can help humanity at this juncture, if its guidance is accepted in the proper spirit. But religion does not acknowledge any such thing as the need for a new world order or of new ideals. Let me explain that while reform is possible in those departments of life which deal with the physical and the social side of things, there is and can be no room for the reformer's activity in religion, when properly understood. To be sure, all have not understood their religions properly, and it is necessary that they do so now. To this extent there is certainly room for reform and the introduction of new thought or ideals; but once it is realized that religion itself is a science and was founded by MEN who knew and understood it as a practical and perfectly rational and consistent system, founded on the Laws of Nature, and that the last word was said on the subject long centuries or rather many millenniums ago, it will be perceived that there is and can be no room for the introduction of new thought anywhere in it. One might as well think of reforming Mathematics, or Geography, or any other exact and precise science ! Reform in religion can and does only mean one thing-the removal of all that is a base accretion to the original doctrine, the rectifying of all departures from the enjoined practice.
That religion is a science will astonish many men, perhaps most men, to-day; and, unfortunately, I cannot
*Delivered at Morrison Hotel, Chicago, under the auspices of the World Fellowship of Faiths on the 1st of September, 1933, at 8 a.m.