Jainism

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Peace,

"Be careful all the while!"

Although the majority of Indians who are religious continue to follow the Hindu paths, Mother India has given birth to several other religions which are not based on the Vedas. One of them is Jainism. Jain teachings recognize that we humans are imperfect, but hold out the promise that through strict control of our senses and thoughts we can attain perfection, freedom, and happiness.

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Peace,

The Tirthankaras and ascetic orders

Jainism's major teacher for this age is Mahavira (" the great hero"). He was a contemporary of the Buddha and died approximately 527 BCE . Like the Buddha, he was the prince of a "kshatriya" clan and renounced his position and his wealth at the age of thirty to wander as a spiritual seeker.
The austerities he tolerated while meditating without clothes in the intense summer heat and winter cold are legendary. Villagers are said to have treated him miserably to make him leave:
Once when he [sat in meditation] , his body unmoving, they cut his flesh, tore his hair, and covered him with dirt. They picked him up and then dropped him, disturbing his meditational postures. Abandoning concern for his body, free from desire, the "Venerable One" humbled himself and bore the pain--Akaranga Sutra

Finally after twelve years of meditation ,silence, and extreme fasting, Mahavira achieved liberation and perfection. For thirty years until his death at Pava, he spread his teachings. He is considered the last of twenty four Tirthankaras ( "Fordmakers") of the current cosmic cycle.

In Jain cosmology the universe is without beginning or end. Eternally it passes through long cycles of progress and decline.

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Peace,

The first Tirthankara is said to have been the ancient Lord Rishabha. He introduced civilizing institutions, such as marriage, family, law, justice, and government, taught the arts of agriculture, crafts, reading, writing, and mathematics, built villages, towns and cities. Twenty three more Tirthankaras followed over a vast expanse of time.

The extreme antiquity of Jainism as a non Vedic, indigenous Indian religion is well documented. Ancient Hindu and Buddhist scriptures refer to Jainism as an existing tradition that began long before Mahavira. After Mahavira's death, his teachings were not written down at first because the monks lived as ascetics with out possessions; they were initially carried orally.

In the third century BCE , the great Jain saint Bhadrabahu led some 12,000 monks south to avoid a famine, which he predicted, it lasted for 12 years. When they returned, they discovered that two major changes had been introduced by the monks who remained in the area. One was the relaxation of the requirement of nudity for monks; the other was the convening of a council to edit the existing Jain texts into an established canon of forty five books.
Eventually the two groups split over the differences into the Digambaras , who left and did not accept the changes as authentic to Mahavira, and the Svetambaras , who stayed near his original location.

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Peace,

Digambaras, Svetambaras


Digambaras ("sky clad") monks wear nothing at all, symbolizing their innocence of shame and their non attachment to material goods. They do not consider themselves "nude"; rather they have taken the environment as their clothing, thus damaging as little as possible by stoically enduring all kinds of weather. they have only two possessions: a broom of feathers dropped by peacocks, and a gourd for drinking water.

Svetambaras ("white clad") monks feel that wearing a piece of white cloth does not prevent them from attaining "liberation".

Peace

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Peace,

The Ethical Pillars


In the midst of a world of decline, as they see it, Jains are given great room for hope. The Jiva -- the individual's higher consciousness, or soul-- can save itself by discovering its own perfect, unchanging nature and thus transcend the miseries of earthly life. This process may require many incarnations.
Jains, like Hindus and Buddhists, believe that we are reborn again and again until we finally free ourselves from samsara , the wheel of birth and death and of life's ups and downs. One who has thus brought forth the highest in his or her being is called a Jina (a "winner" over the passions), from which the term Jain is derived.