Notes on Modern Jainism

Author(s): Mrs Sinclair Stevenson
Publisher: Oxford

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JAINA ASCETICS.
The Jaina say that one of Mahāvira's great messages to the human race was that man could attain salvation through his own efforts independently of Brahmanic aid. Unlike Buddha, he laid the greatest stress on asceticism as a means towards attaining that end, and Jainism has proved the forerunner of much of the most revolting asceticism current in the India of today. It has been said that as knowledge is wisdom to the Brahman, and purity and love to the Buddhist, so is asceticism wisdom to the Jaina.
Monks. It is easier for an ascetic or Yati (49) to attain heaven than for a layman, but before a man may become an ascetic he must obtain leave from his parents or guardians. If he be married he may still become a Yati (or Sādhu) on gaining his wife's permission or after her death, but a Bāla brahmacāri (M44549412), i.e. a man who has never been married, is held in higher honour.
Before his initiation or dikṣā (191) the Yati gives up everything save five garments (three upper and two lower
ones), and a blanket ; in the case of a Possessions. Svetämbara these would be yellow in colour, and in that of a Sthānakavāsi white; the Digambara, of course, keeps no clothing. (In Ahmedabad some of the Svetāmbara ascetics wear white with yellow over it, and these men are considered to be more devout ).
He keeps also two or three more pieces of cloth to wrap round his food and to strain his drinking water, and a
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