Studies in Buddhist and Jaina Monachism

Author(s): Nand Kishor Prasad
Publisher: Research Institute of Prakrit Jainology & Ahimsa Mujjaffarpur

Page 54

THE SALIENT FEATURES OF JAINA ACARA
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It is really very difficult to foresee the disastrous consequences which may come out of such a negligible mistake commited by a person while offering food to a monk or the like Thanks to the foresight and carefulness of the Jaina monks who tried to evade injury to others even by risking their personal ease and comfort.
It has already been remarked that the precepts discussed in the previous pages help in keeping the vow of non-killing. Besides, the five samitis or restraint over the five modes of the body is, no doubt,
ense use in this respect. If a monk is careful in walking (iriya), in speech (bhāṣā), in receiving alms (eșaņā), in receiving and keeping requisites (adananikșepara) and in the disposition of bodily excreta (uccarapraśravana), he cannot run the risk of breaking the vow of non-killing.? Appropriate instructions are issued in this respect. For instance he is not allowed to walk by unused roads in which the presence of any insect is difficult to find cut, to speak harsh and unkind words which may lead to quarrels and disputes, to disobey any of the forty-two rules of begging alms, to receive and keep any of the requisites without making it free from living beings and to deposit bodily excreta at a place full of living beings.
(c) Samyama or self-restraint
The precepts as regards samyama may conveniently be taken up under three sub-headings, viz. precepts regarding (i) moral life of the Jaina monks, (ii) abstinence from bodily decoration and (iii) perfect self-control.
i. Moral life of the Jaina monks : The Jaina monks, like other Indian inendicants, were admonished to observe a sublime moral discipline. The worst thing that was feared to corrupt them was sex. It was only because of this that the Jaina Order framed unsparing rules as regards monks' relation with women.
We are told that a woman is as dangerous to a celibate monk as a cat is to a chicken. A monk, therefore, with a view to avoid this
1. Uttar, 24. 1-18. 2. Ayar (SBE. Vol. XXII), 2. 3. 1. 6 (p. 137). 3. Ibid, 2. 4 l-? (PP 149-155); Dasv, 7th Chap.; Țhān, 569, p. 403b. 4. Vide Infra, Pindiyalcpabhojana'; Supra, pp. 17-19. 5. Ayar (SBE. Vol. XXII), 2. 5. 1. 14-15 (p. 161); 2. 6. 1. 11 (pp. 168.69);
Uttar, 24. 14. 6. Urtar, 24. 15-18; Suyg (SBE. Vol. XLV), p. 364; Kapp (SBE. Vol. XXII),
P. 308.