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RIGHTNESS OF ACTION AND
JAINA ETHICS
He who lives in society inevitably asks himself and others on many occasions in life, "What shall I do in a particular situation? Or whether I ought to do or ought not to do certain action?" Many a time we have been told, “What you have done is wrong. Or you ought not to have done this.” Sometimes in answer to such questions and such statements, judgments or evaluations, it may be said that an action is wrong if it does not conform to the moral code in question. Particular actions are to be performed in a particular moral code of the community. An impartial reflective mind cannot be satisfied with such kinds of decisions, regarding the rightness or wrongness of doing certain actions. Besides, moral codes may conflict and what is considered right according to one moral code may be regarded as wrong according to the other moral code. For instance, in accordance with one moral code untouchability is right, whereas in accordance with the other moral code untouchability is wrong. In one moral code meat-eating is forbidden, while in the other it is enjoined. The situation is worsened when two parts of the moral code of community prescribe contradictory performances to be right or wrong. All this means that moral codes cannot be relied upon as a sure guide to the rightness of an action. Of course, I do not wish to deny that there may be moral codes which prescribe universal rules of conduct but even then it cannot be said that 'right' and 'wrong could be defined in terms of conformity or otherwise to the moral code of a particular society.
The reflective mind is not convinced of the reason for an action's being right or wrong in terms of moral code. In
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