________________
82: Śramana, Vol 64, No. III, July-Sept. 2013
vegetation, which are one-sensed beings possessing only the sense of touch; meanwhile mobile being include two-sensed, three-sensed, four-sensed and five-sensed beings, which "are accordingly... endowed with the faculty of touch and taste; touch, taste and smell; touch, taste, smell and sight and touch, taste, smell, sight and hearing, respectively." The five-sensed beings are further divided into four types of embodiments that possess mental faculties or intelligence: human, animal, hellish and celestial beings. It is precisely because the embodied jiva possess bodies that they are consistently reborn, having to work out their relationship with matter until the point of liberation.
So what is matter in Jain philosophy? In Concept of Matter in Jaina Philosophy, Jogendra Chandra Sikdar provides an elaborate and detailed comparative study between the Jain understanding of matter and other Indian schools (including modern scientific notions of matter). Sikdar explains, "According to Jaina metaphysics, the most visible form of ajivadravya (nonliving substance) or acetanatattva is (pudgalästikäya) matter which exists in the Universe in various forms, such as, earth, water, fire, air, shadow, objects of four senses -hearing, smell, taste and touch, physical mind, speech, bodies, etc. up to karmic matter and (paramāņu) ultimate atom. Pudgalais a tangible reality within the sensuous and supersensuous experiences in perceptible and imperceptible conditions. Its finest form is (paramāņu) ultimate atom."21
Thus, out of the non-living substances, matter is the most populous, frequent, or present. This is understandable when we take into consideration Sikdar's further explication of matter's eternality: "it will never be destroyed nor will it be converted into other substances...whatever material substance there was in the past, (that much) is at present and will be in the infinite future." As such, it is eternal and therefore permanently fixed in quantity. Interestingly, when Sikdar further explains the characteristics of matter, he is sure to note how it is devoid of soul, of jiva and therefore devoid of sentiency and consciousness." In fact, he stresses the fact that pudgala is the opposite to jiva, similar, of course, to Jyoti Jain's description of the jiva being matter's antithesis. Notably, this raises the question about how matter is perceived. M. R. Gelra highlights that this question asks "whether ajiva is only a negative form of jiva or it is a positive entity." It seems that it is precisely due to the fact that pudgala has eternal and immutable natures that matter is given a positive spin.
24
While there are numerous other qualities and modes that Jains give to matter, such as certain sensory qualities, colors, smells and tastes, one thing that Sikdar highlights in his text, which is most salient for this paper, is a short line: "Matter is active."25 He notes that it is due to the trinitarian principle of origination-decay-permanence that is engendered in the fact that substances have modes and qualities. He writes, "The permanence of quality in a substance can be called inactivity, while the origination and decay of mode in it are to be called activity, kriyä, modes of a substance are infinite, so there are stated to be infinite divisions or conditions of activity." fact, Sikdar describes activity even further, as a vibration. Indeed, "vibration is the nature of matter; activity takes place in it due to this vibrating nature and it is capable of being active. Only by its capacity of vibration (parispandana Saktiguna) [sic]. Therefore it is active by its own capacity."27
