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100 RELIGION AND PHILOSOPHY OF THE JAINAS (nirjarā), and what the ultimate state of a perfected individual is (mokşa). This particular branch of philosophy, therefore, includes topics like sensations, perceptions, consciousness, pains and pleasures, moralities of life, moral depravities, building of the bodies and all factors of the individuality. No other philosophical system in India has gone into so many details of life-building as Jainism has done. Like other systems, Jainism teaches the doctrine of rebirth, the nature of which depends on the nature of karmas that are just ripe to manifest themselves soon after death. Two Principles upon which Karma Doctrine is based
There are one or two principles which must be mentioned upon which the doctrine of karma is based, in order that it may be understood : first, that this universe is not a mere congeries of substances set together and set into motion by some authority, but is a system of itself, subject to laws inherent in its own constitution. And such law is a proposition derived from our observation of the universe, which proposition teaches us that certain phenomena occur regularly in certain circumstances. The law is, therefore, not a command, but a formula.
Second, that the phenomenon of life, and also of consciousness, is different, not only in degree, but in kind, from the phenomenon known as activity of matter (motion or vibration). In the activity of matter there is growth by addition in dead objects subject only to chemical laws. Whereas the living being takes to itself particles foreign to those that are in the body and changes their nature and assimilates them with its own body, suspending when necessary chemical action; and in living beings there is the reproduction of the species. These characteristics are not possessed by dead objects. With reference to consciousness, the difference is more marked. Consciousness can never be identical with motion; they may go together, and one may even be dependent upon the other; but they are different. Consciousness is a synthesis, and not a
xion. ji is a synthesis of perceptions and conceptions. Consciousness and life have some substance other than material
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