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XXVII. THE ASSUMPTION OF EITHER ETERNALITY OR NON-ETERNALITY DESTRUCTIVE OF RELIGION
In the immediately preceding verse a community of fault in the 'non-equivocal' doctrine of eternality and non-eternality etc. has been stated; now, exhibiting by name some varieties thereof, he brings to light first the service to the Three Worlds on the part of the Lord of the Three Worlds, the Lord of the earth, the Saviour from an invasion, as it were, due to such enemy people emboldened by unreal imaginings on the part of those setting them forth, and he says - XXVII. With the 'non-equivocal' doctrine there are not experiences of pleasure and pain;
not merit and sin, also not bondage and liberation.
thus through others by the sword of the vice of contentions of bad reasonings is abolished even the world without residue.
With the non-equivocal' doctrine, with acceptance of the alternatives of 'non-equivocal' eternal and non-eternal; experiences of pleasure and pain do not fit; and merit and sin do not fit; and bondage and liberation do not fit. The employment of the negative repeatedly is for sake of showing absolute unfittingness. As thus: For a self, to begin with, which is 'nonequivocally eternal the two experiences of pleasure and pain are not appropriate; for the mark of the eternal is 'having a single permanent form without loss and without origination". Therefore, when the self, having experienced pleasure, feels pain through the force of the apparatus of the mass of its causes, then, since from the difference in its own-nature noneternalness follows, there is the consequence of loss of its having a single permanent form; the same is to be said of it when, having experienced pain, it enjoys pleasure.
Or, if it is said that 'This speech-usage is through difference of states, but, even with states differing, there is not difference in their possessor; just as with a snake, in the states of coil, straightness, etc.'), No! Are those different from it, or non-different? If different, there is not the connection 'it has these', because that goes too far). But, if non-different, there is loss of their being one single permanent form, 'only like that', 'only in that state'. And how, if it has 'non-equivocally' that one form, could there be even difference of state? (204)
Furthermore, experiences of pleasure and pain are to be brought about by merit and sin; and the bringing about of them is practical efficacy; and that that on the part of an eternal isolated is not appropriate, either successively or not successively, has been more or less stated. For this reason is said not merit and sin: merit is good karma, to be obtained by the actions of giving and so forth; sin is bad karma, effectable by the action of hurting, etc. These also do not fit, because of the above stated deduction. Likewise not bondage and liberation: bondage is mutual interlacing of the self in its several infinitesimal parts (pradesa)) with atoms of karma, like a mass of metal and fire; liberation is waning of all karma. In the non-equivocally eternal these two also would not be. For bondage is a particular conjunction,
1) In using this simile, common in such discussion, the author had in mind the ahi kundala-nyayo, on which see Col. Jacob's A handful of popular Maxims, p. 11.
2) If, being different, they are 'his', what of other things equally different?
3) On pradesas of soul see Outlines of Jainism, pp. 16, 30, 88, 90, 95.
