The Religions of India: Handbooks on the History of Religions, Volume 1, Edited by Morris JastrowHopkins, Edward Washburn
Religion
The Religions of India: Handbooks on the History of Religions, Volume 1, Edited by Morris Jastrow
Hopkins, Edward Washburn
India -- Religion
The clauses here explain that the Niggantha must avoid different
possibilities of stealing, such as taking food without permission of
his superior. One clause states that he may take only a limited ground
for a limited time, _i.e_., he may not settle down indefinitely on a
wide area, for he may not hold land absolutely. Another clause insists
on his having his grant to the land renewed frequently.
The Fourth Vow: I renounce all sexual pleasures, either with gods, or
men, or animals. I shall not give way to sensuality (etc).
The clauses here forbid the Niggantha to discuss topics relating to
women, to contemplate the forms of women, to recall the pleasures and
amusements he used to have with women, to eat and drink too highly
seasoned viands, to lie near women.
The Fifth Vow: I renounce all attachments, whether little or much,
small or great, living or lifeless; neither shall I myself form such
attachments, nor cause others to do so, nor consent to their doing so
(etc.).
The five clauses particularize the dangerous attachments formed by
ears, eyes, smell, taste, touch.
It has been shown above (following Jacobi's telling comparison of the
heretical vows with those of the early Brahman ascetic) that these
vows are taken not from Buddhism but from Brahmanism. Jacobi opines
that the Jains took the four first and that the reformer
Mah[=a]v[=i]ra added the fifth as an offset to the Brahmanical vow of
liberality.[30] The same writer shows that certain minor rules of the
Jain sect are derived from the same Brahmanical source.
The main differences between the two Jain sects have been catalogued
in an interesting sketch by Williams,[31] who mentions as the chief
Jain stations of the north Delhi (where there is an annual gathering),
Jeypur, and [=A]jm[=i]r. To these Mathur[=a] on the Jumna should be
added.[32] The Çvet[=a]mbaras had forty-five or forty-six [=A]gamas,
eleven or twelve Angas, twelve Up[=a]ngas, and other scriptures of the
third or fourth century B.C., as they claim. They do not go naked
(even their idols are clothed), and they admit women into the order.
The Digambaras do not admit women, go naked, and have for sacred texts
later works of the fifth century A.D. The latter of course assert that
the scriptures of the former sect are spurious.[33]
In distinction from the Buddhists the Jains of to-day keep up caste.
Some of them are Brahmans. They have, of course, a different
prayer-formula, and have no St[=u]pas or D[=a]gobas (to hold relics);
and, besides the metaphysical difference spoken of above, they differ
from the Buddhists in assuming that metempsychosis does not stop at
animal existence, but includes inanimate things (as these are regarded
by others). According to one of their own sect of to-day,
_ahi[.m]s[=a] paramo dharmas_, 'the highest law of duty is not to hurt
a living creature.'[34]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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