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A SOURCE-BOOK IN JAINA PHILOSOPHY
no meaning and the Tsvara would have been powerful and karma would be some commodity to be distributed at His will. But we find, that karma works his own way. There is a regulated mathematical and determined effects of karnia which works their own course. In this sense, Tswara has no place in the karma theory.
', TRANSFERENCE OF KARMA
According to the Vedic tradition, the individual ātman is at the mercy of the all powerful Ī śvara. Without the grace of T svara the ātman cannot do anything. I švara is the one who dispenses karma to different individuals, Who sends one to the hell or heaven.
The Jaina theory of karma does not accept this view. There is no possibility of dispensation of karma by any external agency like I švara. Karma cannot be distributed like pieces of money. One man's karma cannot be transformed into other. The individual soul is free. It is by its own activity that it earns the karmic bondage in this empirical world. Each individual soul is responsible for its rise or fall. The ātman which gets involved in the wheel is like the river vetaraņi or the tree kūtaśālmalī. The soul expresses its two nature, gets the fruits of perception. The individual soul is the doer of its own karma and the enjoyer of the fruits of karma. The soul that follows the righteous path is its own friend, while the soul that goes astray and follows un-righteous path is its own enemy.
The Jaina theory of karma maintains that the fruits of karma expressing in happiness and misery are the results of the activity of the soul. The soul gets the fruits according to its dessert. The Vedic tradition and the Buddhist view are refuted by the Jainas, regarding the distribution and the transform of karma.s
1 Mahābhāratā, Vanaparva, adhyāya 30, sl. 28. 2 Uttarādhyayana 20, 36 3 Uttarādhyayana 20, 37 4 Uttarādhyayana 4, 4; 6, 3 5 (a) Airamimithia - Pt. Dalsukh Mālvaniā p. 131
(b) Sri Amara Bhārati, Bhāratiya dardano me karma virevcana
- Upadhyāya Amaramuni
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