Religion and Culture of the Jains

Author(s): Jyoti Prasad Jain
Publisher: Bharatiya Gyanpith

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RELIGION & CULTURE OF THE JAINS
Sir Sanmukham Chetty: "Jainism was the religion of the Dravidian people who were the pre-Aryan inhabitants of India. I am tempted to believe that Jainism was probably the earliest religion prevalent in India and that it was the flourishing religion when the Aryan migration came in India and when the religion of the Vedas was being evolved in the Pubjab."
Maj. Gen. J.G.R. Furlong, F.R.A.S.: "Instead of Jainism being, as was formerly supposed, an offshoot of Buddhism, it is shown to extend as far back as 3,000 B.C. It is found flourishing alongside the nature-worship of the rude tribes in northern India."
G. Satyanarain Murti: "Jainism seems to be an indigenous product of ancient schools of Indian thought. Whatever the early savants of European fame have said to the contrary, it is to be noted that Jainism with all the glory of its dharma and plenitude of its literature, both secular and religious, has been handed down from a hoary antiquity."
S.N. Gokhale: "Ahimsa is the keynote of Jainism, a philosophy which comes from pre-Aryan days."
Dr. Hermann Jacobi and others are also of opinion that Jainism was related to the primitive philosophy of India, because of certain of its metaphysical conceptions, animistic belief, heroworship in the form of worship as deities of perfected mortals, and of its being a very simple faith, be it in worship, rituals or morals. It has also been described as 'a very original, independent and systematic doctrine', of which 'the realistic and rationalistic tone does not fail to attract notice of even a casual observer.'
Moreover, unlike many other indigenous religious sects, Jainism has succeeded in preserving down to the present time its integrity as a separate world in the midst of preponderant Hinduism. It is a complete system with all the necessary branches, such as dogma or ontology, metaphysics, philosophy, epistemology,