Liberation 1st Bk, 7th Lecture-3rd Lesson

[Anne Terri]

God's Living Bible - The Third Testament - Research Library - Jainism

Liberation 1st Bk, 7th Lecture
THIRD LESSON

Some are awakened as middle-aged men and exert themselves well, having, as clever men, heard and received the word of the learned 1. The noble ones have impartially preached the law. Those who are awakened, should not wish for pleasure, nor do harm, nor desire (any forbidden things). A person who is without desires and does no harm unto any living beings in the whole world, is called by me 'unfettered.' (1)

One free from passions understands perfectly the bright one 2, knowing birth in the upper and nether regions.

'Bodies increase through nourishment, they are frail in hardships.' See some whose organs are failing (give way to weakness).

A person who has no desires, cherishes pity. He who understands the doctrine of sin, is a mendicant who knows the time, the strength, the measure, the occasion, the conduct, the religious precept; he disowns all things not requisite for religious purposes,

p. 67

in time exerts himself, is under no obligations; he proceeds securely (on the road to final liberation) after having cut off both (love and hate) 1. (2)

A householder approaching a mendicant whose limbs tremble for cold, may say:

O long-lived Sramana! are you not subject to the influences of your senses?

O long-lived householder! I am not subject to the influences of my senses. But I cannot sustain the feeling of cold. Yet it does not become me to kindle or light a fire 2, that I may warm or heat myself; nor (to procure that comfort) through the order of others.

Perhaps after the mendicant has spoken thus, the other kindles or lights a fire that he may warm or heat himself. But the mendicant should well observe and understand this, that he may order him to show no such obsequiousness. Thus I say. (3)


Footnotes

66:1 The scholiast says that there are three classes of the awakened: the Svayambuddha, the Pratyekabuddha, and the Buddhabodhita. The last only is treated of in the text.

66:2 I.e. self-control.

The Sacred Books of the East -translated by various Oriental scholars and edited by F. Max Müller Vol. xxii
Gaina Sutras Translated from Prakrit by Hermann Jacobi in two parts -Part I -The Âkârâ?ga Sûtra
Liberation 1st Bk, 7th Lecture-3rd Lesson
God's Living Bible - The Third Testament - Research Library - Jainism
Jaina Sutras, Part I (SBE22), translated by Hermann Georg Jacob Jacobi - 1884

This text is in the public domain within the United States, because it was published prior to 1923