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Preface
The worldly soul has been wandering from birth to birth since the time immemorial. The root cause of that wandering lies in ignorance about its true nature. The question may arise, how can one stay ignorant of himself? The amazing though it may seem, we have been staying in ignorance about ourselves on account of the impact of deluding Karma. That delusion is of two types, perception related and character related. Our first objective should therefore be to remove the perception related delusion. That can be done by the gain of right perception.
The conviction of one's true nature is the rise of right perception. Thereby one tries to stay true to the nature. Staying in tune with the right perception is the right character. That normally takes time, because the bondage of Karma obtaining since the infinity cannot be eradicated easily. For that purpose the seers have laid down the following six rituals that a house holder should perform every day. The Sanskrit term for essential is Ävashyak. Therefore these six essentials are known as Ävashyakas
Sämäyik,
Chauvisattho, Guru Vandan,
Pratikraman,
Käusagga,
Pachchakhän,
the practice of equanimity
the prayer to 24 Tirthankaras
the obeisance to preceptor
the turning back from transgressions
the concentration and meditation
the vow to do something worthwhile
In North America, Pathshalas are conducted at all the places, where Jains have settled. But most of them concentrate on the philosophical side like teaching of Nav Tattva, six Dravyas, theory of Karma, etc. There is nothing wrong in teaching those aspects, if practical side like worship, performing the essential activities etc. is also simultaneously kept in view. What, however, happens is that the practical side remains ignored.
This reminds me of the popular story of a blind and a disabled man being caught within a fire. The blind could move but did not know which side he should move in order to escape from the fire and the disabled knew how to escape, but he could not move on his own. The blind therefore picked up the disabled on his shoulder and started walking as directed by the latter. Thereby, both of them escaped from the fire. Similarly the religion consists of knowledge as well as action. Any one of them to the exclusion of the other would not be fruitful. The seers have therefore laid down, 'Jnänkriyäbhyäm Mokshah'.
The emphasis has therefore to be laid on performance of the six essentials. Pratikraman Sutras are meant for that purpose. Since, however, they are mostly in Ardhamägadhi language, the people do not understand the same. While undertaking the essentials, they therefore happen to recite the same mechanically. Such mechanical recital hardly serves any purpose.
