Nobility of the Jaina

[Guest guest]

"Sandhya Jain" <sandhya176> wrote:

Pioneer-16 May 2006

Jainas: cream of Hindu society 

"Jainas have a story that Aristanemi, the twenty-second

Tirthankara, wished to renounce the world without getting married.

His paternal cousin, Sri Krishna (himself the avatara of Vishnu),

reminded him that all previous world Saviours had married and raised

families before renouncing the world in pursuit of the spiritual

quest; hence he should marry and please his father"

 

Sandhya Jain

 

The Union Minister for Minority Affairs' determination to impose

minority status upon Jainas has come has a shock to a community that

has long regarded itself as the cream of Hindu society. Obviously,

Mr. A.R. Antulay is only continuing the UPA policy of fragmenting

the nation by offering reservations to Muslims in Congress-ruled

states and extending 27 percent reservations to OBCs in higher

education. Coupled with the Prime Minister's hints that the private

sector should open its doors to caste-based employment, this has

made Ms. Sonia Gandhi's supremacy in Indian politics the most

implosive period in the nation's modern history.   

 

Barring some wealthy Digambara Jaina families with ambitions for

maulvi-like control over the community, Jainas have neither sought

nor desired minority status. Jainas have never shirked hard work or

competition, and therefore excel in all spheres of life, from trade

and industry to professions where merit alone assures ascendance.

Far from furthering their cause, minority status could actually

deprive them of access to institutions of higher education as Jainas

are a miniscule community, never having crossed even half percent of

the population. With merit criteria removed, minority status will

push Jainas from the penthouse to the basement. 

 

Despite their size, Jainas enjoy disproportionate influence over the

Hindu community and are perceived as the pinnacle of Indic

spirituality. Jainas share common roots with Hindus and aver that

twenty-two Tirthankaras hailed from the Iksvaku dynasty of Shri

Rama, while two belonged to the Hari clan of Shri Krishna. No wonder

the Indian constitution classifies Jainas and other native spiritual

traditions as 'Hindu,' though like the others, Jainas retain their

distinction on the Indic spectrum, adhering to particular forms of

belief and worship. This is hardly the same as being 'separate,' a

mischievous colonial concept invented to promote opposition and

division. 

 

Jainas profoundly influenced India's cultural and social life. Early

on, they compelled Hindus and Bauddhas to accept the supremacy of

ahimsa (non-injury to all creatures) and vegetarianism, and

fashioned these into cornerstones of Indian culture. According to

Jaina theology, the universe and everything in it, even rocks and

stones considered inanimate in other traditions, is a living

organism with a soul (jiva, atma). Long before modern science

accepted that plants are living organisms with senses, Jainas were

aware that plants were living beings worthy of respect. The

knowledge that plants breathe oxygen at night is behind the Indian

sentiment against plucking flowers or cutting trees after sunset. 

 

Jaina awareness of nigoda (single celled) life-forms led to the

injunction against animal sacrifice and consumption of meat. Meat is

a perfect breeding ground for nigodas, hence consumption of meat

leads to a fall in spiritual evolution. Sufferings inflicted upon

living creatures are revisited upon one through the karmic

trajectory, and man suffers for misdeeds committed in any lifetime.

Jaina tradition emphasizes man's personal responsibility for other

species ("parasparopagraho jivanam") and the environment. This

compassion towards lesser beings made Jainas pioneers in setting up

hospitals for birds and animals. 

 

Jaina tradition does not bestow special sanctity on the cow as it

respects all life without distinction, but Jainas tend to take the

lead in movements against cow slaughter as it is historically and

culturally a humiliation of the Indic tradition and Jainas cannot

stay aloof from such a flagrant act of violence for this gentle

animal. Among Hindus, Vaishnavas became vegetarian. Devotees of Devi

continued to practice animal sacrifice on ritual occasions and many

coastal and other groups retained meat in their diet. However, once

the vegetarian ethos was entrenched as morally superior, it could

never be dislodged through the centuries that followed. 

 

Jainas similarly absorbed Hindu beliefs, even if these did not enter

the official theology. The Mahabharata expounds four debts that the

individual must discharge: deva rna by worship; pitr rna by

continuing the family; rsi rna by acquiring and disseminating

knowledge; and manava rna by service to humanity. Jainas have a

story that Aristanemi, the twenty-second Tirthankara, wished to

renounce the world without getting married. His paternal cousin, Sri

Krishna (himself the avatara of Vishnu), reminded him that all

previous world Saviours had married and raised families before

renouncing the world in pursuit of the spiritual quest; hence he

should marry and please his father. 

 

Hindu and Jaina traditions are like the weft and woof of the

unstitched garment favoured by our saints; they cannot be separated

without severe haemorrhage to both. The shared spirituality of the

Indic tradition is like an unstitched garment - whole, inclusive,

interlinked, and unthreatened by the inevitable loss of culture,

tradition and diversity that accompanies monotheistic traditions.

The latter may be compared to stitched garments - elegant,

structured, appealing, but ever haunted by the inward sense of loss

that accompanies the rejection of diversity in divinity. 

 

Minority status is a historical millstone round the nation's neck,

caused by the fact that the Constituent Assembly offered some

privileges to the Muslims in order to avert Partition, but retained

the provisions despite Partition. Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel had the

vision to foresee that a political minefield lay ahead on this

route; he favoured a seamless society without religious barricades. 

 

In fact, there is a serious flaw in the argument that India's

religious minorities need special constitutional guarantees to

preserve themselves. Unlike monotheistic faiths, the sanatana dharma

accords space to other creeds and India has been a civilizational

haven to persecuted communities such as Jews, Syrian Christians,

Parsis, Tibetans and Bahai's. It has also sought to accommodate

historically aggressive communities. 

 

These communities have received an unwarranted bonanza from the

Sonia Gandhi-led UPA, in the form of exemption from implementing the

27 percent OBC quota in educational institutions run by them. This

will give minority-run educational institutions an unfair political

and economic clout, while aggravating social divisions in the larger

society by inducing competition on the basis of caste, rather than

merit. As recently as August 2005, a Supreme Court Bench comprising

then Chief Justice Mr. R.C. Lahoti and Justices Mr. D.M.

Dharmadhikari and Mr. P.K. Balasubramnyan, had directed the national

and state level Minorities Commissions to find ways of reducing and

ultimately ending the list of notified minorities, rather than

increasing them. The court warned against encouraging fissiparous

tendencies in the nation; it seems the warning fell on deaf ears. 

 

EOM

--- End forwarded message ---

 

 

 

 

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