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STAGES OF SPIRITUAL DEVELOPMENT
203 If in spiritual concentration four breaths are spent, then in exercising good thoughts you spend 6 breaths; in sitting in silence 10; in speaking, 12; in sleeping, 16; in walking 22; in sexual intercourse 36. This is the Jaina view — and it is the subtle and not the ordinary breaths
The action of sexual reproduction, or more correctly called the action of satisfying the sex passion, is very injurious to the individual; injurious to his own soul, binding it with karma and rendering it impure, causing ignorance and consequent misery.
The sex passion having been defined as subtle and gross, and some information given concerning it, the next thing is to know man's relation to the sex passion; and in view of the kind of thing which it is, namely, an injurious thing, it should be controlled and avoided; so we now consider : Brahmacarya
It means the control of the sex passion; and as the control may be either entire or partial, we have two divisions :
1. Entire giving up;
2. Partial giving up. (1) Entire giving up of the sex passion would be to refrain all the time from all of the following eighteen ways of indulging - with a being having a deva body, with a being having a physical (audārika] body, either mentally, in speech, or actually, by satisfying the passion yourself, causing or helping others to do so, consenting to others doing so. That makes 18 ways (3 x 3 x 2 = 18). This is the chastity of the monk.
(2) We are now dealing with the fourth of the 12 special rules of the layman who wishes to advance spiritually; the point reached is that because the sex passion in injurious to spiritual progress, therefore it should be avoided. The layman, however, is not able to avoid it entirely, and so the thing is to know what means he can take to avoid and control the sex passion as much as possible.
The 4th Vrata is called sva-dāra-santoșa-para-dāra-viramana vrata, and is the means which the layman may adopt for this purpose. That which he undertakes to refrain from is the act
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