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Concept
Jain philosophy
Summary
Jain philosophy or Jaina philosophy refers to the ancient Indian philosophical system of the Jain religion. It comprises all the philosophical investigations and systems of inquiry that developed among the early branches of Jainism in ancient India following the parinirvāṇa of Mahāvīra (5th century BCE). One of the main features of Jain philosophy is its dualistic metaphysics, which holds that there are two distinct categories of existence: the living, conscious, or sentient beings (jīva) and the non-living or material entities (ajīva).
Jain texts discuss numerous philosophical topics such as cosmology, epistemology, ethics, metaphysics, ontology, the philosophy of time, and soteriology. Jain thought is primarily concerned with understanding the nature of living beings, how these beings are bound by the processes of karma (which are seen as fine material particles) and how living beings may be liberated (moksha) from the cycle of death and rebirth (saṃsāra). A peculiarity of Jainism is to essentially associate several renunciatory liberating practices with the imperative of non-violence (ahiṃsā). Jainism and its philosophical system are also notable for the belief in a beginning-less and cyclical universe, which posits a non-theistic understanding of the world and the complete rejection of a hypothetical creator deity.
From the Jain point of view, Jain philosophy is eternal and has been taught numerous times in the remote past by the great enlightened tirthankaras ("ford-makers"). Historians trace the developments of Jain thought to a few key figures in ancient India, mainly Mahāvīra (5th century BCE, a contemporary of Gautama Buddha) and possibly Parshvanatha (8th or 7th century BCE, though this is disputed). According to Paul Dundas, Jain philosophy has remained relatively stable throughout its long history and no major radical doctrinal shift has taken place. This is mainly because of the influence of Umaswati's Tattvārthasūtra, which has remained the central authoritative philosophical text among all Jains.
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