Acharya Mahaprajna
It is very difficult for us to judge one who is very familiar to us. It is easier to understand a stranger. The soul is so near to us that it has remained a mystery. It is necessary to disclose the mystery in order that we may live a purposeful life. Man has been continuously disclosing the mysteries of the world and that is the main cause of his progress. In the course of the investigations of the secrets of the universe, scientists have arrived at the stage of atomic explosions. Psychologists have analysed the mind and discovered the unconscious. We have acquired great strength by unveiling the secrets of nature, which would have been impossible otherwise.
The world would not have evolved without the discovery of the sources of energy. The present progress of mankind has been due to electricity and fuel. The recent petroleum crisis has made the whole world worried. Can our civilization survive without petrol, electricity, and atomic fuel? No. it cannot. We should not forget the fact that electricity has been the chief source of human strength. The development of spiritual strength also depends on electrical energy. This may appear to be unconvincing, but it is a fact.
The human body is stuffed with electric currents. Students of Jain philosophy know that the Taijasa body is the driving force of all the activities of man. The gross and subtle human body will not even be able to stir without the Taijasa body. All its functions depend on the Taijasa body. The entire energy in the human body is manifested by the Taijasa body. It is also the passage through which we enter into the world of the soul It is also the medium of acquiring miraculous powers. In ancient literature such powers were known by the name Labdhis or Yoga-Vibhutis or Rddhis.
The Jain Agamas speak of two kinds of men: those who possess Rddhis and those who do not. Rddhi is energy, which is limitless and astounding.
When speak of spiritual matters, we should first make a distinction between the outer, and the inner worlds we live in. Mahavira said: "One who knows the 'inner' also knows the 'outer' and vice versa.' Thus there are two situations before us, our situation with reference to the outer world and the situation with reference to the inner world. Society belongs to the world outside us, and the individual to the world inside us. The individual and the society are two aspects of human life. Our relations with the external world mean relations with something other than ourselves. Society is constituted of our relations with men other than ourselves. We remain individuals, i.e., ourselves when do not enter into relations with others. Although we retain our identity as individuals, yet we live a social life. But what happens in the personal life of men has a distinct character. Thus we live two kinds of life: individual life and social life. What we call spiritual life means our own personal and individual life. What we call social life is life in and with other men outside us. Just as we live in two worlds, in the same way we search for two kinds of truth. The one is subjective truth and the other is objective truth. The one is truth about the individual self and the other is truth about the outer world.
The world inside us is the world of consciousness. The world outside us is full of diversities; it contains several kinds of substances. It is a conglomeration of atoms. The world inside us is a world of pure consciousness. Thus there are two worlds for us the world of material objects, and the world of pure consciousness. Spiritual life is life in consciousness. When we withdraw from it, we enter into the world of material objects. The search for truth implies a diving into the depths of our own being. This search is sometimes accomplished with the help of instrumental cause’s and. at other times, through a sudden discovery or intuitive flashes of knowledge. You might have heard of several incidents connected with the search for the mysteries of the universe. I shall narrate one.
Somebody once saw a deer come to a spring of water on a hill. It used to thrust one of its legs into the water and keep it there for some time. It would come to the spring daily and do so. This continued for quite a few days. The man who saw it marked its crippled leg and thought that it was lame. One day it was seen walking normally as if nothing had happened to it. The watching man examined its leg and it was found that its bone had been fractured. The man thought over the matter and framed an hypothesis. With this began the development of naturopathy. The system of curing diseases with the help of clay came into being. The system of curing diseases with the help of sound also developed in the same way.
There is another instance. A certain man suffered from chronic headaches. He consulted several physicians, but none succeeded in curing him of his disease. One day he quarrelled with another man. The quarrel resulted in a battle between the two. The man with the headaches was struck in his foot by an arrow from the adversary. He instantaneously felt that his headache had disappeared. People began to wonder how the injury caused by the arrow could be related to the headache. Experiments showed that whenever a patient of headaches was struck with a sharp point in his foot, his disease disappeared. Thus the relationship between a particular point on the foot and headaches came to be established. The Acupuncture system of curing patients of diseases is also the result of such experiments.
The human body is essentially composed of electricity. Mutually unbalanced electric waves produce various diseases in the hotly. Deformities in the Taijasa body produce deformities in the gross body. We may invent cures of various kinds of diseases by manipulating the electrical waves coming from the Taijasa by bringing about a harmony in them.
What I have said above is to show that our progress depends upon many forces of nature and that we have been able to know only a few of them and to harness them. Ancient Acaryas had made several discoveries and propounded a number of theories, which had and have been recorded, but their application into practice has disappeared. That is why we find it difficult to understand them and take practical advantages of them.
