Book Title: Most Ancient Aryan Society
Author(s): Ram Chandra Jain
Publisher: Institute of Bharatalogical Research Sriganganagar Rajasthan
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Bharatiya
acheived Immortality through personal efforts ; not by the grace of God or Brahma. They moulded their earthly institutions in consonance with their basic beliefs. Bhārata is the birth place of the ideology of Spiritualism.
We do not possess extant literature of the Spiritualism Pre-Aryan Bhārata. The Harappa script, even if rightly deciphered, may only help a little.
The present Bhāratīya spiritual thought may be divided into three currents; the Brāhmaṇic, the Buddhist and the Jainist. The later two thoughts are well known as Śramaņa ideologies distinguished from the Brāhmaṇı ideology. The Jain and Buddhistic tenets are essentially similar. Both believe in the spiritual tenets of Non-Violence, Truthfulness, Non-Stealing and Perfect Continance. Buddha replaces non-possessiveness or Non-attachment by Liberality. The other spiritual tenets of both are strikingly similar.19 The Jain thought is pre-Buddhistic. Twenty-third Tirthamkara Pārsya preceded Buddha. Pārsva is now accepted as a historical personage.20 Buddha fully accepted the Chaujjāma of Pärśva. Buddha devoloped his religion on the foundation of the Chaujjāma of Pārsva. The Chaujjama of Pārsva was developed into Pañcha-Mahāvrata of Mahāvīra. Of these two Śramaņic thoughts, we may safely rely upon Jaina Sūtras to represent the pre-Buddhistic spiritual thought.
Upanişads represent the Brāhmaṇical spiritual thought. As seen later, the Brāhmaṇas did not accept spiritualism truthfully. They borrowed spiritual thoughts from their pre-Aryan adversaries, now friends, in a perverted manner. They never honestly accepted the Doctrine of Non-Violence. The word Ahimsā occurs only once in the Pre-Mahāvīra Upanişad, the Chhāndogya Upanişad. Non-Violence and
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