Vaishali Institute Research Bulletin 1

Author(s): Nathmal Tatia
Publisher: Research Institute of Prakrit Jainology & Ahimsa Mujjaffarpur

Page 153

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VAISHALI INSTITUTE RESEARCH BULLETIN NO. I
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drill. But one has to pay this price for the sake of precision and proper systematization. As physical exercise properly guided by scientific process results in the improvement and invigoration of the body and its several organs, intellectual exercise also leads to similar improvement in the human intellect. There are men who are chronic victims of indecision and are exploited by clever men who find it profitable to accelerate their tizzy. But professors and teachers are a class of people who help their unfortunate fellow-beings out of this morass of ignorance. They clear away their cobwebs of misconception by imparting true instruction. But unfortunately even among teachers there found persons who want to derive wealth by sophistical arguments. They also professedly teach their pupils to use sophistry in order to gain undue advantage by puting a wrong complexion on the truthful testimony of honest persons. In ancient Greece, these professional sophists had a respectable place in society. More often than not the professional politicians are found to misguide the uninformed masses and by holding out rosy prospects of easy prosperity hoodwink them to gain their votes in a democracy and lull them into sense of security in a totalitarian state. The effects of such bad education or want of education are eliminated and in most cases mitigated by the gift of true knowledge and stimulation of true insight. The academic processes such as the definitions of the terms and the exhibition of fallacies go a long way in the cultivation of the intellect. Education does not claim to generate new faculties of knowledge, but it regenerates the existing resources and next makes the trainees fitter for the struggle for existence. The religious teachers inculcate the harmful consequences of moral depravity. They show the bright side of life, the wholesome effects of moral discipline. They teach them to be unselfish and compassionate and sympathetic to the people in humbler station of life. Logic like ethics has a practical side. Theoretical knowledge makes the victims of the rule of thumb realize the reasons underlying this success of blindfolded processes. The crucial test of sincerity enlightened by knowledge is the freedom from secular motives of private self-aggrandizement. There have been persons who sacrifice or subordinate their private ambitions for power and wealth and find the fulfilment of their mission in the emancipation of their fellow creatures from the shackles of ignorance, superstition and ego-centric preoccupation. The pursuit of knowledge for the sake of knowledge becomes a passion. They are the salt of the earth as has been said by Jesus Christ. The Jaina Tirthankaras, the Bodhisatvas of the Mahāyāna school and the Sthitaprajñas (men of unwavering wisdom) of the Gita are embodiments of selflessness, for whom the