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CHAPTER IV.—JAINA RITUAL
This relates to the pursuit of the path of salvation in communion with people living in accordance with Jainism. The object of ritual is the ideal, the goal, namely, truth, perfection, the perfect soul. Ritual is the way in which we manifest our love and reverence for our ideal. It is the enjoyment of what is beyond us, until devotion becomes ecstasy and we feel that we are what we considered to exist outside us, that we are one with the goal, and that the ideal is realized within ourselves.
The subject is long and complicated and concerns, in the main, the occult side of Jainism. But one or two points may be noticed.
Knowledge may be derived by considering four aspects of the thing known: nūmai, sthāpanā, dra vyu, and bhāva, or its name, status, substance, and nature, e.g. we may adore our ideal soul as typified in Lord Mahāvīra. The name of Mahāvīra evokes the ideal before our eyes in all its glory; the thrill with which it is accompanied is our true worship. So in the soldier's breast “Napoleon” and “ Alexander” arouse thrills of reverence which are akin to feelings of worship. This is the nūma point of view.
The second method, sthāpanā, is the installation of the adored one in a material representation : photograph, picture, keepsake, image, model, statue--these are examples. Absent friends can be loved and remembered by this means; absent guides can be reverenced ;
