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Shri Mahavir Jain Aradhana Kendra
www.kobatirth.org
Acharya Shri Kailashsagarsuri Gyanmandir
Buddhism
192
depends on our reversal of the sequence of emanation by our knowledge of it; or, to put it more plainly, on reducing the multiplicity of isolated differentiations literally back to the primal entity of the one." Buddhism believes like the Vedānta and the Sāṁkhya that the right knowledge of the ultimate reality can deliver an individual from his worldly shackles. All bondages are psychological in nature. A thing has value only in reference to the mind that desires it and comes to attach itself to it. The bondage is never a corporeal and material thing. It is essentially psychical and spiritual. If a mind can dissociate itself from the mental attachments to the worldly things, if the mind becomes proof against the influences of worldly things, if the mind can rise above such temptations and does not allow itself to be influenced by the external things, naturally the mind can release itself from the painful shaokles. If a mind becomes immune to the external influences, it remains for ever in a peaceful state. It is also a fact of human experience that a man generally pursues only those things which he thinks to be right and harmless. Man usually pursues the right and avoids the wrong, irrational and evil. This is possible only when one acquires right knowledge of things. As man's bondage is a creation of his mind and is based on knowledge, the Buddhists emphatically contend that liberation can be attained by proper knowledge which brings to an end ignorance and illusion.
1 Shayer Stanislav : Mahayana Doctrines of Salvation, p. 5. Ā 11
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