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JAINISM After its pilgrimage of innumerable existences in the various inferior stratifications, the life-monad rises to the cranial zone of the macrocosmic being, purged of the weight of the subtle karmic particles that formerly held it down. Nothing can happen to it any more; for it has put aside the traits of ignorance, those heavy veils of individuality that are the precipitating causes of biographical event. Decisively, once and for all, it has broken free from the vortex. It is now deathless, birthless, suspended beyond the cyclic law of karmic causation, like a distilled drop of water clinging to a ceiling or to the underside of the lid of a boiling pot. There, among all the other released life-monads clinging to the interior of the dome of the divine World Being, it remains forever-and the monads in that state, of course, are all as alike as so many drops. For they are pure particles, serene existences, purged of those imperfections that make for individuality. The masks, the former personal features, were distilled away, together with the seed-stuff that would have ripened into future experiences. Sterilized of coloring, flavor, and weight, the sublime crystals now are absolutely pure-like the drops of rain that descend from a clear sky, tasteless and immaculate.
Furthermore, since they have been relieved of the faculties of sensation that are inherent in all organisms (those that render sound, sight, smell, taste, and touch), the released lifemonads are beyond the bounds of conditioned understanding which determine the modes of being of the various human, animal, plant, and even inorganic species. They neither perceive nor think, but are aware of everything directly. They know Truth precisely as it is. They are omniscient, as the sheer life-force itself would be if it could be relieved of the modifying darknesses of specific organisms, each with its limited range of sense and thinking faculties. For the moment the limitations that make particular experiences possible are eliminated, the perfect intuition of everything knowable is immediately at
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| SR No. | 007309 |
| Book Title | Philosophies of India |
| Original Sutra Author | N/A |
| Author | Heinrich Zimmer, Joseph Campbell |
| Publisher | Routledge and Kegan Paul Ltd |
| Publication Year | 1953 |
| Total Pages | 709 |
| Language | English |
| Classification | Book_English |
| File Size | 34 MB |