Outlines of Jainism

Author(s): J L Jaini, F W Thomas
Publisher: Cambridge University Press

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CHATTER II.—METAPHYSICS Jaina philosophy is characterized as much by logic, comprehensiveness, and cogency as Jaina theology is by its simplicity, common-sense, and straightforwardness. The topics of Jaina Metaphysics may be arranged as follows:
i. The soul and the non-soul; ii. the kinds and qualities of soul; iii. substance and attributes; iv. the six substances; v. the five magnitudes; vi. the karmas, or actions; vii. their kinds; viii. the seven principles ; is. the nine padārthas (categories); s. the effect of karmas on the body and soul; xi. the five kinds of bodies; vii. the four forms of existence; xii, the six tints of the soul ; xiv. the stages in the evolution of the soul. In conclusion we give, xv, the Three Jewels of Jainism.
I. JĪVĀJĪVA : THE SOUL AND THE NON-SOUL There are two great categories: soul, jiva; and nonsoul, ajīva. The whole universe falls under this division, which is logically perfect; it is division by dichotomy. The division is not the same as that into "the I and non-I”: the jīva class includes much of the non-I class. It is when we look upon the universe from the point of view of life or consciousness that we divide all things which it contains into living beings (jīva) and nonliving beings (ajīva). The division into the I and mon-I, or into self and non-self, helps us, however, to understand the division into jīva and ajīva, since “self” or “I” is the most immediate and ever-available kind of jīva that we can study, and one which from the earliest times we have been advised to study (1).