Pristine Jainism

Author(s): S M Jain
Publisher: Parshwanath Vidyapith

Page 10

FOREWORD
by DR. L.M. SINGHVI, M.P.
Senior Advocate, Supreme Court of India Member, Permanent Court of Arbitration at the Hague President, Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts Trust
Formerly India's High Commissioner in U.K.; Chairman,
High Level Committee on Indian Diaspora.
Shri S. M. Jain is a retired Forest Officer and has worked on many responsible and challenging posts in State Forest Department. With his vast knowledge and experience of forestry, Shri S. M. Jain anaiyses certain issues relating to Jainism and the Jaina way of life. His analysis leads him to research into what he calls Pristine Jainism.
According to Shri S. M. Jain, Pristine Jainism which emphasised rational activity and good conduct as preached and practised by liberated souls, the Arhats, is now overwhelmed by rituals and ostentatious display of wealth in the name of and on the pretext of Bhakti. He argues that the precepts of Jainism are simple and are based on scientific principles of cause and effect and on an understanding of the chain of action, reaction and interaction. He makes a plea for rationality in belief, thought and action and a plea for the rejection of rituals and superstitions. He underlines the contradiction between the Jaina concept of Samyaktva rooted in an objective and rational perception of reality, That which Is, and Mithyātva which leads to an unreal and erroneous understanding and conduct. He shows that the Jain doctrine favours Puruşārtha and exhorts against inaction, which Jainism dubs as Pramāda. He challenges various forms of ritual worship and interprets Jain teachings in the perspective of scientific rationality at the heart of which is the principle of symbiosis or interdependence of life at all levels and in all its manifestations.