Sramana 2016 01

Author(s): Shreeprakash Pandey, Rahulkumar Singh, Omprakash Singh
Publisher: Parshvanath Vidhyashram Varanasi

Page 74

CONCEPT OF CONSCIOUSNESS IN JAINISM: 67 pudgala or material contents, but these are having consciousness due to association with the conscious soul.
In Jainism, mind is made of matter (pudgala), but it has a quality of thinking and desiring, hence mind also bears consciousness. A conscious mind is very useful for a real development of a human being. If it is controlled or restrained, then it is useful for spiritual development, if it is uncontrolled or wanton, it is a big cause for fall of a person. Neurologists talk about brain and accept that mind is a product of brain. According to Śvetāmbara Jaina texts, this mind is a separate entity and pervaded in the whole body, whereas Digambara texts accept its shape as eight feathered lotus flower and its residence in the heart only. But mind is used in every knowing activity of sense organs and its own. In Vyākhyāprajñapti-sūtra a question has been raised that a mind is conscious (sacitta) or unconscious (acitta)? Answer has been given that mind is not conscious, it is unconscious. Here it is to be clarified that mind is different from a soul' and it is made of matter or pudgala', hence it is not conscious, but is found only in living beings and formed at the time of thinking only."
A sense organ is associated with an object, mind is associated with that sense organ and the soul is associated with the mind. This is the procedure of knowing the objects through sense organs. Somewhere a soul can know the objects directly through the mind. Sorrow and happiness can be known in this manner. Psychologists accept mind as a separate entity and Freud mentions three types of mind as-conscious, unconscious and sub-conscious. We are aware of the conscious mind. A big part of our mind remains unconscious, which has a store of imprints of our unfulfilled wants and saņskāras. Sub-conscious mind has a function to get some feelings or desires from conscious mind to unconscious mind and from unconscious mind to conscious mind.
Consciousness in body Jaina scriptures enumerate five types of bodies as {1} gross body (audārika), {2}protean body, (vaikriya), {3}translocational body