YJA Convention 1994 07 Chicago IL First

Author(s): Young Jains of America (YJA)
Publisher: Young Jains of America YJA USA

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yet to be hit upon by the modern biological sciences. And finally the Jains have emphasized upon the inexhaustibility in the supply of souls. In the words of Jacobi:
with powder. The nigodas furnish the supply of souls in place of those who have reached nirvana. But an infinitesimally small fraction of one single nigoda has sufficed to replace the vacancy caused in the world by the nirvana of all the souls that have been liberated from the beginningless past down to the present. Thus it is evident that the samasara will never be empty of living beings."
"All material things are ultimately produced by the combination of atoms. Two atoms form a compound when the one is viscous and other dry, or both are different degrees of viscousness or dryness, such compounds combine with others, and so on. They are, however, not constant in their nature but are subject to change or development (parinama) which consists in the assumptions of qualities (gunas). In this way originate also the bodies and senses of living beings. The elements of earth, water, fire and wind are bodies of souls in the lowest stage of development and are therefore spoken as 'earth-bodies', 'water-bodies', etc. Here we meet with animistic ideas which, in this form, are peculiar to Jainism. They probably go back to a remote period, and must have prevailed in classes of Indian society... The notions of the Jains about beings with only one organ are, in part, peculiar to themselves... We may call these elementary lives; they live and die and are born again in the same or another elementary body. These elementary lives are either gross or subtle; in the latter case, they are invisible. The last class of one-organed lives are plants; of some plants each is the body of one soul only, but of other plants each is an aggregation of embodied souls which have all functions of life, as respiration and nutrition in common. That the plants possess souls is an opinion shared by other Indian philosophers. But the Jains have developed this theory in a remarkable way. Plants in which only one soul is embodied are always gross; they exist in the habitable parts of the world only. But those plants of which each is a colony of plant-lives may also be subtle, i.e., invisible and in that case they are distributed all over the world. These subtle plants are called nigoda; they are compounds of an infinite number of souls forming a very small cluster, have respiration and nutrition in common and experience the most exquisite pains. Innumerable nigodas form a globule and with them the whole space of the world is closely packed, like a box filled
The karma theory is an integral part of all systems of Indian philosophy but at first sight it may appear that the karma theory is somewhat incongruous with the animistic notions of the early Jain religion and is a later interpolation under the Brahmanical influence. This, however is not correct. According to Jacobi, the broad outlines of the karma theory, if not all its details, must have been as old as Jainism itself and was closely and carefully interwoven with animistic notions. Besides, some of the technical terms in the karma theory have been used by the Jains alone in their original etymological sense, which has later influenced other systems. In brief, the Jain theory of karma is not only old, it is also original, breaking a new ground of its own. In the words of Jacobi:
"It seems so obstruce and highly artificial that one would readily believe it had later developed a metaphysical doctrine which was grafted on an original religious system based on animistic notions and intent on sparing all living beings. But such a hypothesis would be in conflict with the fact that this karma theory, if not in all details, certainly in the main outlines, is acknowledged in the oldest parts of literature and presupposed by many expressions and technical terms occurring in them. Nor can we assume that in this regard the Canonical books represent a later dogmatic development for the following reason; the term asrava, samvara and nirjara, etc., can be understood only on the supposition that karma is a kind of subtle matter flowing or pouring into the soul (asrava), that this influx can be stopped or its inlets covered (samvara) and the karma matter received into the soul is consumed or digested, as it were, by it (nirjara). The Jains understood these terms in their literal
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