________________
The Jains through Time
right path by their powers of rationality and pass, it would be the golden age of our discrimination.
development. Though men and women
have different virtues and capacities they In the history of the human race, there have should be accorded equal respect and equal been times when all the paths of progress rights. Only then can we have a truly were monopolised by men. Men alone healthy society. exercised power or were permitted the pursuit of pleasure. Religion too was A mother is a maker and creator - she can restricted to them. Women were permitted never be a destroyer. If the discipline and nothing, not even their own emotional life. prudence she embodies could be put to use, No independence at all was given to them, then the escalation of nuclear weapons Men controlled women's lives from birth to would be stopped. The whole of creation death. This was a woman's fate.
requires compassion, not cruelty, and the
epitome of compassion is the race of The race of mothers has the capacity mothers. needed to capture the heights of spirituality. Woman can reach the pinnacle of success A strong and healthy society can be created even in their social lives. There is no area in only if respect for the race of mothers is the fields of science, politics or art where inculcated in us all. Then this century will she is unable to excel. Will a time ever come witness a re-awakening of womankind and when the entire human race lives together herald a new sense of well-being brought without distinctions of class, caste, colour about by women. and importantly gender? Should it come to
254
Jain Education International
For Private & Personal Use Only
www.jainelibrary.org
