Prolegomena to Prakritica et Jainica

SR No.: 011088
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: Satyaranjan Banerjee
Publisher: Asiatic Society
Total Pages: 248
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 17 MB

Page 184

BANERJEE: JAINISM AND NON-VIOLENCE
167
A.D.) was the greatest exponent of Jainism. He attacked Manu seriously and called his Manava-samhita as Himsăsastra. Manu has depicted the excellence of ahimsa in so many words, but only has said that in the case of sacrifice the killing of animals is not an offence (tasmad yajne vadho' vadhah). Hemacandra protests against the statement of Manu in his Yogaśastra (II. 33-49). Hemacandra says that it is a distortion of reality to think that the animals have come to this world to be offered to gods for the prosperity and betterment of the world. It is not true to say that the Jivas living in this world will be reborn as divine beings. Hemacandra calls these people hypocrits who preach the religion of cruelty. Hemacandra goes on to say further that if the animals are sacrificed for an abode in heaven, then why should one not kill one's parents in the sacrifice for getting an abode in heaven? His argument rests on the famous verse which he quotes from the Daśavaikālikasūtra :
savve jīvā vi icchanti jivium na marijjium / tamhā pāṇivaham ghoram niggantha vajjayanti
nam || (I. 6.10)
"All animals wish to live, and not to be slain; therefore the Jain monks must relinquish the dangerous killing of animals."
Hemacandra then concludes by comparing ahimsa with the beneficient mother:
mateva sarva-bhūtānām ahimsā hitakāriņi / ahimsaiva hi samsāram arāvamṛta-sāraṇiḥ // 2.50 ahimsā duḥkha-dāvāgni-prāvṛṣinya-ghanāvali | bhava-bhrami-rugārtānām ahimsa paramauṣadhi ||
2.51
"Ahimsa is like a beneficient mother of all creatures, in the desent of Samsara (mundane life) ahimsa works like a stream of nectar to the forest-fire, ahimsa is the course of rain-clouds, for the beings tormented by the