YJA Convention 2002 07 NJ Fifth

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

Page 24

Ahimsa Thru the Ages
Dr. John Cort
In this talk, Professor Cort will compare the social Luther King, Jr., called "the beloved community." Classical
and ethical values of ahimsa and nonviolence in expressions of nonviolence within American culture have India and the United States.
included Henry David Thoreau going to jail rather than
pay war taxes, Martin Luther King, Jr., leading the "Ahimsa" is often times translated as “nonviolence," nonviolent struggle for civil rights, and the movements in but this translation hides as many differences as opposition to wars in Vietnam, Central America, Iraq, and the number of similarities it illuminates. Ahimsa is now Afghanistan. closely connected with other concepts in Jainism, including dharma, shanti, and moksha. We see that An analysis of the ways in which ahimsa has been ahimsa is thus primarily concerned with the spiritual understood and practiced within Jain communities, and well-being of the individual, who strives to avoid the ways in which nonviolence has been understood in harming other living beings in order to minimize the the United States, shows that these concepts diverge as negative karmic effect upon his or her own soul. Classical expression of ahimsa within Indian culture have been the strict Jain interpretation of vegetarianism, the use of cloth masks to protect water and air, and animal shelters.
Nonviolence in recent centuries in Europe and North America has come to be closely associated with the concepts of justice, peace, and liberation. Nonviolence is thus primarily concerned with the wellbeing of other human beings within society, and the goal of nonviolent action is to create what Dr. Martin
notes:
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