Lessons of Ahimsa and Anekanta for Contemporary Life

Author(s): Tara Sethia
Publisher: California State Polytechnic University Pomona

Page 71

Lessons of Ahimsā and Anekānta for Contemporary Life
important to first discuss briefly the principle of ahimsā. The term ahimsā is negative, but the principle is entirely positive. Ahimsā embodies the realization that all life belongs to the same global family and that to hurt others is to destroy the community of life, the basis of all sacredness. Thus, ahimsa requires not only that we avoid hurting other living beings, but that we must endeavor to help each other.4 Indeed, Umāsvāti defines the purpose of life-forms as helping each other: "Souls exist to provide service to each other.”5
Jainism embraces a very strict and far-reaching concept of ahimsā. Unlike others who claim that unless a person intended the violence which follows an act the person is not guilty of performing a violent act, the Jains claim that if an act produces violence, then that person is guilty of committing a violent act even if the violence was not intended. For example, if a monk unknowingly offers poisoned food to his brethren and they die from the poisoned food, in the Jain view the monk would be guilty of performing a violent act, but in the Buddhist view the monk would not be guilty. The crucial difference between the two views is that the Buddhist view excuses the act, categorizing it as non-intentional because the monk did not know that the food was poisoned, whereas the Jain view regards the act as intentional because the monk is responsible for his ignorance, and, therefore, for any act that follows from this ignorance. Thus, according to Jainism the moral imperative to practice ahimsā includes the requirement to remove the ignorance that prevents a person from seeing the violence embodied in his or her actions.
From a metaphysical perspective, Jainism can be viewed as transforming the principle of ahimsă embodied in the respect for the life of others, into epistemological respect for the views of
4 See John M. Koller, Asian Philosophies, (Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Prentice Hall, 2002), pp. 39–40. For a fuller discussion of the Jain view of life see also John M. Koller, The Indian Way (New York: Macmillan Publishing Company, 1982), pp. 108-132.
5 Umāsvāti, Tattvärtha Sūtra, 5.21. op. cit., p. 131.
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