Lord Mahavira and His Teachings

Author(s): Vallabhsuri Smarak Nidhi
Publisher: Vallabhsuri Smarak Nidhi

Page 77

Lord Mahavira and His Teachings
55
processes are all neatly and throughly laid down in the Jaina canons. Even during the times of Alexander, the Macedonian king, we have very many instances of Jaina yatis or tapasvis. Probably the order of yatis or samnyasis is indigenous to Jaina tradition.
Ahimsa has been the sheet-anchor of Jainism. Nowhere else in the other traditions has this basic virtue so scientifically, scrupulously and throughly integrated with the main doctrine. Jainism is the only tradition which has consistently made this tenet soak into the very vitals of its teachings and practices. The strict vegetarianism that is enforced and the injunction to taking food before, dusk in the evening show how elaborately and practically Ahimsa has been made to enter into the day-to-day lives of its votaries. The singular uncompromising insistence on Ahimsa is the special and exclusive feature of Jainism.
The ethical code of Jainism is a most beautiful blend of achara and vichara (conduct and reflection). Almost all the members of the usual group of virtues adumbrated regarding conduct or achara (like satya, ahimsa, brahmacharya, asteya, aparigraha) owe their immense importance mainly to Jaina tradition. Jainism tackles the inculcation of all these virtues in its votaries through a very wise and practical hierarchical scale of anu-vratas, maha-vratas, etc. On the side of reflection or vichara, it is Jainism which has stressed right from its very beginning tattvachintana. Probably, it was Jainism which originally instituted the order of yati-munis wholly devoted to tattva-chintana to the exclusion of all other activities. It is due to this insistence on vichara or tattva