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SOME PROBLEMS IN JAINA PSYCHOLOGY
This stage of self-development belongs to persons who are helpless in the practice of virtue. They have knowledge of the right and good, but they have no power to practise them as they have no control over their senses. Aristotle raised a similar objection against the Socratic doctrine of 'virtue is knowledge', since men act wrongly even knowing what is right. The will in these cases is not strong. Effective virtue would be possible with a strong will and the requisite energy of the soul to translate the will into virtuous action. The soul has to develop self-control gradually for the sake of fuller self-realization. From the next stage onwards there is a gradual expression of self-control.
In the four spiritual stages that are described here, we have to establish the right attitude which requires moral effort for further progress. We may compare these four stages to the state of persons described in Plato's Parable of the Cave. "And now", said Socrates, "let me show a figure how far our nature is enlightened or unenlightened",16 Socrates presents a picture of some human beings living in an underground den from their childhood, with legs and necks chained so that they cannot move. They can only see what is in front of them. The den has a mouth towards the light. Fire is blazing at a distance above them and behind them. Between the fire and the prisoners, there is a raised way and low wall built along the way like the screen which marionette players have in front of them over which they show their puppets. They would see their own shadows and the shadows of men and animals passing along. And the prisoners would mistake the shadows for realities.17 This is the stage of mithyatva, the perversity of attitude towards truth. In this stage we are unable to see the truth because we are bound and chained to perversities through the operation of the deluding karmas.
But if one of them is liberated and is compelled to stand up and walk towards the light, the glare will certainly distress him. He will suffer pain. He would be unable to see the reality and would persist in maintaining the superior truth of the shadows. If he is then taken to the light, he will be in a confused state till he gets accustomed to the sight of the upper world. This may be compared to the stage of sasvadana samyagdrsti, where there is hesitation and very faint and indistinct glimpses of the truth. But once he gets accustomed to the change, he will be able to see the things of the world. He will gaze upon the light of the moon and the stars and the spangled heavens. The vision may still be indistinct for him. He may not know the meaning of it all. But once he gets the clearer vision of the truth, he will realize the folly of his fellow-prisoners and he will pity them. This is the fourth stage of avirata samyagdṛṣṭi. Stripped of all moral flavour, the parable roughly.
16 Plato: The Republic, Book VII. 17 Ibid.
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