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JAINISM AND WORLD PROBLEMS
The Jainas are inspired by the example of their GUIDES who are called Jinas or TIRTHAMKARAS; and work in confidence and tranquillity. They are not upset by anything in the shape of ill-luck or disturbed by calamity; death itself has no terrors for them.
This is the way of conquering ignorance by means of knowledge of Truth. It may be added that only he who has no fear of death or calamity in his heart will be able to practise UNIVERSAL Love fully, no one else. For we kill and fight with others only to satisfy some one or other of the bodily appetites, never for the heavenly goods, that is to say, for the sake of the soul. Even where religious hatreds have led to bloodshed in the past the cause has not been the realization of the soul-nature as it really and truly is in itself, but some misunderstood dogma of allegorical origin that seemed to inculcate the belief that the favour of an external god or gods could be had by waging religious wars. It is obvious that he who understands the nature of his soul will at once get rid of the superstition that any real benefit could be secured to the soul that way.
To come now to the value of Universal Love (ahimsa) as it has been termed in Jainism: if any one ask me what is the one remedy for bloodshed, hatred and warfare, I would unhesitatingly say ahimsa, as it is explained in Jainism. If you want to live in peace with your neighbours, if you wish to abolish fear altogether from your heart, then practise ahimsa, that is, Universal Love. For the measure of the freedom of one's neighbour is the measure of one's own freedom, in truth.
Through political fear and national narrow-mindedness we are never at peace with any of our neighbours in reality. This is only too evident from the enormous sums we are spending on maintaining military strength and naval and air fitness to deal an effective blow at a moment's notice to
any one on our national frontiers. If we really love our
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