Jainism For All

  Tirtha of Mahavira constituting monk, nun, shravaka and shravika During Mahavira’s lifetime, large number of people, both men and women, became his followers. From these grew the four orders of his community. Tirtha is a complete order of monks, nuns, male follower (shravakas) and female followers (shravikas). A tirthankara is one who organises the order (tirtha) according to his convenience. The 1st Tirthankara Rishavdev formed the four orders of tirtha for the first time. Mahavira was the head of a very illustrious order. According to the Agam, Mahavira had an excellent community of 14000 monks headed by Indrabhuti, of 36000 nuns headed by Chandana, 1,59,000 male followers headed by Sankha-Sataka, and 3,18,000 female followers headed by Sulsa and Revati. Besides, he had in his order  300 monks who were masters of 14 Purvas,   1300 monks who had avadhi knowledge,   700 monks who were kevalins, 700 monks who had power to transform, 500 monks with great ...

  Sramana. Nirgrantha, Jina and their meaning Sramana is a Jain concept whose meaning is ‘seeker’. The word ‘sram’ means hard work. Sramana is a community of ascetics who renounced the worldly life and practiced rigorous austere religious steps to reduce the burden of Karma from their soul. The shramana believed in the act of deed rather than the rituals. The belief is that this world (sansara) is full of sufferings. To reduce suffering in day-to-day life, one needs to practice non-violence (ahimsa), non-possessiveness (aparigraha), truthfulness (satya), non-stealing (achaurya) and chastity (brahmacharya). Sramana believes that the aim of human life should be to uplift the soul from material bindings or attachment and make a better life. Sramana labours, toils, exerts himself for higher religious knowledge. The term Nirgrantha used in Jainism means “life free from all bindings” or “life without knot”. During the time of Mahavira, the Jain ascetics and the Jain community were kn...

Teachings of Lord Mahavira 1)     1)   In this world, nobody knows about his previous birth or future life. They do not know whether their soul changes or remain intact from one birth to another. But there are a few saint - like people who, either by intuition, or being informed by their gurus, know from where they have come, what will they achieve in the present life and what will be their destiny in future. According to Jain tirthankaras, the journey of soul is never ending and takes many births according to their karma. Destruction of bad karmas elevate the soul to higher levels and destruction of all karmas lead to liberation of soul. 2)   Human beings are attached to sense objects via sensory organs like eyes, ears, nose, tongue and skin to understand different forms, hear various sound, smell different fragrances, taste different food and touch different objects. Their mind is controlled by attraction and repulsion; that is why they lose all senses of ...

 Life of Spiritual Discipline When prince Vardhaman was 28 years old, his parents died. Vardhaman decided to leave the family and become ascetic but on his brother’s request he postponed his thoughts for two more years and started practising self-discipline. In the last year, he distributed his personal belongings to the common people every morning. Vardhaman took initiation into the order of the Shramans. He went to a garden called Jnata-shanda-vana on the outskirts of Kshatriyakundapura on the tenth day of the dark fortnight of the month of Bhadra under the uttarphalguni star during afternoon, surrounded by his relatives and local people. There, at the foot of an Ashoka tree, he took off all his clothes and ornaments, tore out the hair of his head in five handfuls and putting a single holy cloth (Devadushya) on his shoulder, set out all alone on his great quest. At the time of renouncing the world, he took the following vows: “From now on till the end of my life, I will observe e...

  Background History of Jain Religion         The history of our country is replete with the names of many deities whom people know as representatives of God. The epic Hindu literatures are filled up with the names of many such God-man (Devata) and God-woman (Devi). Jainism is one religion where the tirthankar a s are the great human personalities mentioned in old texts who made history by transforming themselves from an ordinary human being to a form equivalent to God. This could be achieved by the tirthankaras by dint of their own efforts.       Jain religion, which is known as Jainism is not the vision of a single tirthankara but it is the collective knowledge of all 24 tirthankaras who propagated their thoughts to the people. The tirthankaras were the prophets to the society who, through their knowledge and vision could give proper directions for the betterment of the society. It has been proved time and again, tha...

    Gosalaka, Founder of Ajivika School of Philosophy Gosalaka was an ascetic who formed the Ajivika Sect. Ajivika is one of the nastika or heterodox school of Indian philosophy. It was a Sramana movement and a major rival of Vedic religion, Buddhism and Jainism. Original scriptures of Ajivika philosophy may once have existed, but they may become lost with time. But the descriptions of the Ajivika fatalists and their founder Gosalaka can be found in both Buddhist and Jaina scriptures. The Ajivika school is known for its Niyati (fate) doctrine of absolute fatalism or determinism. The predetermined fate of living beings was the major distinctive doctrine of their school. They did not believe in the Jain school of thoughts, regarding attainment of liberation of soul ( moksha ) from the eternal cycle of birth and death. Further Ajivikas considered the karma doctrine of Jainism as fallacy. Ajivika metaphysics included a theory of atoms, which was later adapted in the Vaisesika s...

 Jain Philosophy 3.Nayavada Nayavada is another doctrine of Jain philosophy that states that every thought is true from a certain perspective, and no idea is false. Nayavada is part of Jainism’s Theory of Reality.   According to this theory, every thought is true from certain standpoint. They become false only when they are absolute.  If they are non-absolute, then they are true. This accommodating attitude of Jain philosophy gives due importance to other philosophies. Nayavada refers to only part of the whole truth. Nayavada does not deny attributes, qualities, modes and other aspects. There are two types of Nayas: 1.        Dravyarthika Naya – it is the way of looking at a thing (appearance) to identify a substance 2.        Paryayarthika Naya – it is the changing state of a substance (mode) Each object, living or non-living, is formed as a collection of two or more elements. Even the same elements can ...

 Jain Philosophy 2.Syadvada or Saptabhangi Naya This argumentation system has seven distinct semantic predicates which may be thought of as seven different truth values. This system of argumentation is referred to as Syadvada or Saptabhangi Naya. Syadvada views things from many angles and reveals their true nature by embracing their different aspects and attributes. Syad in the word “Syadvada” means “may be”. The real sense of the word Syadvada can therefore be objective realism – viewing things under their diverse aspects by a multiple or many-sided vision. Every object or Dravya is subject to the triple operation of birth, life and death. These triple operations go on at all times in an uninterrupted simultaneity in every object. The part of a thing which is stable or persistent is its very substance, and the part which is mobile or changing is its modification. Substance and its modifications are neither completely different nor completely identical, which implies that every o...

Jain Philosophy  Jainism includes three related doctrines which deal with the complex and manifold nature of knowledge: 1.        Anekantavada (the theory of many standpoints) 2.        Syadvada (the theory of conditional predication) 3.        Nayavada (the theory of partial standpoints) 1.Anekantavada is the Jain doctrine about metaphysical truths that engaged in ancient India. It states that the ultimate truth and reality is complex and has multiple aspects. According to Jainism, no single, specific statement can describe the nature of existence and the absolute truth of an object. Only anekantavada or many sidedness can explain the multidimensional existence of an object.   The absolute truth of an element cannot be described in a single statement. On the contrary, due to its multidimensional existence, only Anekantavada or many sidedness can explain the truth. The non-absolut...