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196
Lord Mahâvîra
being is hirnsa. Piercing, binding, overloading, and starving the nimals are all forms of hinsa, and should be avoided. Even rinking ill of others or contemplation of injury is mental violence. For giving practical guidance in this matter, injury to others has been divider according to the mental attitude of the person into four kinds52-accidental (e.g. when injury is inflicted on living beings in cooking, walking, bathing, etc.) occupational (e.g. when a soldier strikes his enemy), protective (e.g. when one kills an attacking tiger or a dacoit) and intentional (when one kills simply for the sake of killing, as for meat-eating and rituals). The householder is required to abstain fully from the fourth kind and to the best of his ability from the other three, while an ascetic is expected to abstain from all the types of violence.
The Jainas were extremely critical of the Buddhists who allowed their monks to eat meat if they themselves did not kill the animals but got the meat in alms. The Jainas argue that but for the meat eaters the butchers would not indulge in the act of killing the animals, and therefore meat-eaters are responsible (though indirectly) for killing. The Jainas were equally critical of the Vaidic practice of sacrificing animals in their rituals which they regarded as violence committed in the name of religion.
The same kind of concession, as is allowed to a householder in the observance of ahinsa, is given to him in the observance of the other four vows. Satya or truth speaking is the second vow to be practised by all. It includes spreading false ideas, divulging secrets of others, back-biting, forging of documents, breach of trust, etc. In the case of the householder the strict observance of the principle is not insisted. Ahimsâ being the most important vow to be observed all other vows are to be observed in such a way that the vow of non-violence is not broken. In a situation where truth-speaking may ensue violence or killing, as for example in revealing the place in which a man is hiding (to escape from the robbers who are intent on killing) deliberate uttering of falsehood is considered more ethical.
The vow of asteya (non-stealing) signified strict adherence to one's own possessions, not even wanting to take hold of the possessions of others. According to the Jaina morality it would be theft if one takes away secretly or by force what does not belong to him, appropriates to himself what somebody else has forgotten
