Prof. Dr. Lawrence A. Babb
The eightfold worship is the most important of all Jain rites of worship. In a sense, all other physical forms of worship (as opposed to bhav puja) may be seen as variations or elaborations of this core rite. The snatra puja, for example, can be seen simply as a highly embroidered version of the ang puja portion of the eightfold worship. The entire eightfold worship is then reiterated at the end. Rites such as Parsvanath's five-kalyanak puja elaborate the agra puja portion of the eightfold worship (the emphasis being on the table offerings), but all elements of the eightfold worship are present. Not only is ang puja reiterated at the beginning of each of the five offerings, but if the five-kalyanak puja is analogous to agra puja, then the snatra puja, which always precedes the main rite, becomes the functional equivalent of ang puja in the sequence as a whole.
To a significant degree, therefore, the question of what is really taking place in rites of worship is the question of what is taking place in the eightfold worship. And the answer to this question is never quite clear. On the one hand, Jains certainly believe that worshiping the Tirthankars can generate worldly prosperity and happiness in this life or another. Many Jains - some Jains would say most - engage in ritual activities precisely for this reason. Indeed, we have seen that even the ascetic commentator Hemprabhasriji gives implicit sanction to this idea by explaining how worldly benefits result from the merit generated by worship. The desire for worldly benefits, however, is inconsistent with the ascetic values expressed by normative interpretations of the rite. How could things be otherwise? Given the very nature of the object of worship - an ascetic - the rite is a celebration of asceticism. In consistency with this, one often hears dravya puja devalued in comparison with the more ascetic bhav puja. "Dravya puja," an Ahmedabad friend said to me, "takes you to the twelfth devlok, but bhav puja takes you to moks (liberation)."[1] Moreover, we have seen that normative interpretations characterize the eightfold worship as itself a kind of substitute form of world renunciation. All this meshes poorly with the idea of worship as a source of worldly well-being. Both ascetic and worldly values exist in Jain ritual culture, but we see that the relationship between them is necessarily ambiguous.
As Laidlaw has shown (1995), there is in fact a deep ambivalence on this issue that is present in many different contexts in the Svetambar tradition. At its most abstract it is manifested in the idea that good karma (the name for which is punya, "merit") is there to be gained by the virtuous, but that the highest goal is the removal of karma (nirjara). I encountered many lay Jains who were quite articulate about this distinction. A very common image for this idea as enunciated by ordinary Jains, one already alluded to, is that of punya as a chain of gold - gold indeed, but for all that a chain. But while the conceptual distinction between good karma and the removal of karma is clear, Laidlaw perceptively and rightly says,
there is no correspondingly clear distinction between the practices that might cause these internal processes. The workings of karmik cause and effect are unknowable, except to those with supernatural insight. Thus what appears from the outside to be two instances of the same act will have different effects, depending on the karma already present in those who perform them and the mental attitude (bhav) with which they are performed. To make a donation is more likely to bring merit, and so luck and good fortune, but insofar as it is motivated by non-attachment to material possessions... or mercy... and so non-violence..., it might also effect the purification of the soul. Conversely, ascetic practices such as fasting or confession are most naturally thought of as removing karma.... But even in the case of the most pious monk, only distant future events will reveal whether he has succeeded in destroying his karms or only in gaining more merit. (ibid.: 28)
We find, in fact, a similar ambiguity right at the heart of Hemprabhasriji's interpretation of the eightfold worship. Readers will recall that she says that the rite removes and "burns" karmas. But at the same time she asserts that it generates merit and material happiness. We know which interpretation she prefers; she gives clear emphasis to the removal of karma. But she never quite chooses between them in the sense of telling us, once and for all, what puja actually "is." The Tirthankar makes a great choice between the path of worldly felicity and the path to liberation. We see that this same choice is presented to the worshiper by every act of worship. Only one who knows his or her heart perfectly can know for sure what choice has been made, and who truly knows his or her own heart?
In the symbolism of worship this ambivalence is manifested in an instability in the metaphor of the worshiper as Indra or Indrani. The worshiper takes the role of wealthy and powerful Indra (or Indrani). The ritually adopted persona of Indra carries with it the image of worldly well-being, and this fits well with the worshiper's expectation that worship will result in earthly versions of heavenly felicity (or even in heavenly rebirth). But the problem is that, although the worshiper's well-being is given due recognition, the ascetic's path alone possesses unquestioned legitimacy. As a result, normative interpretations of the ritual act emphasize mimesis. Metaphor gets tightened into actual analogy; the worshiper's identity as a regal deity gives way to the idea that he is a renouncer who imitates his spiritual king: the Tirthankar. At this point, kingly largess becomes the ascetic's giving up. But the worshiper's role is finally ambiguous. Who is the worshiper? The matter is never quite settled. At one level the worshiper is powerful and prosperous, but this image is always challenged by omnipresent ascetic values.
Given the tradition's bias in favor of ascetic values, the values most attuned to the tradition's highest aspiration of karmic eradication, and given also the inevitable pull of worldly necessity for most people, this ambiguity must take the form of a tension. There is not the slightest doubt, moreover, that this tension is felt as quite real by many lay Jains. This was revealed to me especially in the constant hedgings and evasions that characterized the many discussions I had with Jain friends about the fruits of worship.[2] I was told repeatedly that although many Jains (some said most Jains - indeed some included themselves) seek good worldly results from their temple-going and other religious activities, they should not be seeking such things. Such persons, I was told, are "ignorant" about what Jainism really is; Jainism is about tyag, giving things up, not about getting things. As an Ahmedabad respondent vividly expressed it, "Jainism is 'choro, choro, choro '! ('relinquish, relinquish, relinquish!')." The entire matter of the worldly results of worship is awkward, even embarrassing, precisely because many Jains do indeed seek worldly benefits from worship while knowing that there is something deeply questionable about doing so.
The tradition thus allows worldly values a sphere of legitimacy. Indeed, worldly felicity is a potential result of every ritual act. But the sphere of worldly values is subordinate; their legitimacy is, at the tradition's highest levels, defensive. Among Jaipur's Svetambar Jains, however, there is another domain of religious practice in which the worshiper's role is recast in a much more stable form. Here worship is focused not on the Tirthankars but on certain ascetics of the more recent past. This pattern will be the subject of the next chapter.
