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36: śramaņa, Vol 63, No. 3, July-Sep. 2012 eternal. Purușa, the dynamic force, supplies its energy to Praksti which acts according to the dominance and variance of its Guņas. This is how the universal affairs are going on. According to Kapila's Sāṁkhya, even though Puruşa supplies its dynamic power to Praksti to act, it remains uninvolved (called “Kūtastha") in the fruits of action.
According to Jainism the universal mechanism is the result of the inter-play of “Jiva” (Soul) and “Ajiva” (Non-Soul-lifeless matter). The action which is thus produced has its own reaction. However, according to Jainism individual soul cannot remain aloof as it was its supply of dynamic power which resulted in a particular action. It is thus clear that but for the involvement or non-involvement of soul, the approach of Sāṁkhya and Jainism for the explanation of universal affairs is practically the same. Therefore, wherever Gītā refers to some Sāṁkhya doctrine, that reference can be treated as made even to Jainism, also.
Gītā directly supports the Jain view that there is no outside authority called “God” when it maintains that:
Na kartstvaṁ na karmāņi lokasya srjati prabhuḥ Na karmaphala saṁyogań, svbhāvastu pravartate//15
or Nādatte kasyaicitpāpaṁ na caiva sukrtaṁ vibhuḥ/
Ajñānenāvstaṁ jñānaṁ tena muhyanti jantavaḥ//16 It means that “God does not Himself do anything, nor does He create actions of other people. He also does not create contact with fruits of action. All this happens by itself. It further says: “The God takes neither merits nor demerits of anyone. Beings are deluded as their intellect is covered by ignorance.” Thereafter in verse 16 Gītā says: “But to those whose ignorance is destroyed by the knowledge of “SELF”, such knowledge reveals the Supreme Soul just as the sun reveals everything." These verses do not deny the existence of “God” but they do suggest in very clear terms that God does not monitor human affairs, and that all this “happens by itself”.
