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18
NON-ABSOLUTISTIC ATTITUDE OF THE JAINAS
(CH.
not so radical. If the Upanisadic thinkers found the immutable reality behind the world of phenomena and plurality, and the Buddha denounced everything as fleeting and sorrowful and pointed to the futility of all speculation, Mahāvira adhered to the common experience, found no contradiction between permanence and change and was free from all absolutism. Existence is not an evil by itself and so freedom does not mean total cessation of it. With the Upanisadic thinkers what is impermanent is sorrowful and only empirical. The reality therefore is what is permanent and blissful. With the Buddha also everything is impermanent and hence sorrowful and substanceless. Freedom, therefore, means total cessation. But Mahāvira did not believe in absolute permanence or total cessation. If life were accepted as an illusory phenomenon, or if it were accepted as nothing but evil and suffering, absolute permanence or total cessation would be the truth or the desired goal. But with Mahāvīra change was as much real as. permanence, and so his position was quite distinct from those of the absolutists. Freedom means freedom from passions only. It is a qualitative change rather than total cessation.
The preaching of ahimsă (non-injury) is the most important task of Mahāvira's life. Feeling of immense respect and responsibility for life inspires his activities. Suffering is an evil, and to impose suffering is to impose evil. Unless and until we are conscious of the vicissitudes of the soul, its transmigrations, we are not on the proper path. One who is conscious of these facts is āyā-vãi (believer in soul), logā-vãi (believer in the world), kammā-vai (believer in karman), and kiriyavãi (believer in action). Repeated births are due to the ignorance of the nature of kamma (actions). Suffering is a fact which is too obvious to overlook. "The world is afflicted, decrepit, difficult to instruct, and ignorant. In this agonized world, see how the afflicted ones are causing pains, here and there, by various means.'3 Injurious activities inspired by self-interest lead to evil and darkness. This is what is called bondage (gantha), delusion (moha), death (māra), and hell (naraa).4 To do harm to others is to do harm to oneself. “Thou art he whom thou intendest to kill! Thou art he whom thou intendest to tyrannize over!'s We corrupt ourselves as soon as we intend to corrupt others. We kill ourselves as soon as we intend to kill others. Pramāda (unmindfulness) and attachment to guna (sensuous objects)
1 ASü, I. I. I as explained by commentators.
2 Ibid. 3 Ibid., I. I. 2.
4 Ibid. 5 tumam si nama tam ceva jam 'hantavvam ti mannasi tumam si nama tam ceva jar 'ajjāveyavvam' ti mannasi.
-Ibid., I. 5. 5. Cf. Your own self is your own Cain that murders your own Abel. For every action and motion of self has the spirit of Anti-Christ and murders the divine life within you. William Law.
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