Asian cultures and religions fascinate me. I have grown up dominated with Western concepts and ideas, that didn’t always makes sense to me, so Eastern philosophy has provided interesting alternatives to my previous conceptions of the world. This semester I am taking two classes to teach me more about Asian ideas: Intro to China and Asian Religions. In each of these classes along with my Theater History class when we were studying Japanese Noh and Sanskrit Theater, they warned us not to get in the common western trap of glorifying the East. A common misconception among westerners is to take our frustrations with the West by developing a sentimental attachment to the East and not taking a realistic objective look at the subject. “Oriental tender mercy has always been liable to this taint of grotesque exaggeration.” (251) I can’t help but think that this is what is happening in the Jainism and Ecology article.
It is too common that westerner glorify the east
The article uses the concept of ahimsa as a model for how modern society can deal with ecological problems. I really agree with the idea that “Pollution, extinction of species, and destruction of forests and wild life are crimes against the earth and against humanity. We have a moral obligation toward nonhuman creation.” (X 232) And Gandhi’s use of the term ahimsa, “If I am a follower of ahimsa, I must love my enemy,” is what I state as the foundation for my own personal philosophy. But from a scholarly standpoint it seems that the article misrepresents the Jains to make a point about compassion towards animals and plants. The article states “There are thousands of pinjrapoles (animal refuges), organized and financed by Jains, in the towns and villages of Gujarat and Rajasthan, for the protection of helpless beasts and birds, whom even their owners forsake and who do not enjoy even the provision of drinking water.” (X 231) I do not claim to be a Jain scholar, but from what I learned about Jainism in my Asian Religions class this information is misleading. To a western audience it makes the Jains seem loving and compassionate, when in fact this isn’t entirely so. In class we learned that Jainist’s main goal is to escape the cycle of reincarnation, and that reincarnation is caused by karma, both good and bad, so the idea of a Jain is not to create good karma, but to eliminate karma all together. This is extremely difficult, of course, because every action creates karma, so it has created a sort of obsessive society in which every action is minimalized to reduce the amount of karma. So while it is true that Jains don’t eat meat, try not to step on bugs or plants or anything alive and even go so far as to boil out the germs in their water so they won’t digest any of them, they do not act so out of compassion but fear that animal cruelty would give them karma.
Jainism is so devoted to eliminating Karma that some monks participate in a ritual called Sallekhana, that is no action at all (including eating) until you die
It is also deceiving to discuss these animal refuges that “assiduously promoted the protection of animals in the name of ahimsa,” because while they did protect the animals they did not offer any aid to the animals. “They are not hospitals in the true sense, for ailments are not treated, but simply refuges for halt, maimed, diseased, and blind creatures for whom nobody cares.” (X 250) In the video we watched in our class of a Jainist animal refuge all of the cows were in extreme pain, there legs were twisted and broken, many looked like they were starving and disease filled their eyes. The Jainists believe that you should protect the animals, because killing them would bring bad karma, however you cannot really help the animals, because that would give you good karma which means you would remain in the cycle. Gandhi, one of the greatest examples of non-violence got into serious trouble with the Jainist community because he shot a cow to end its suffering. The Jains said that if the cow was suffering it was due to actions in a past life and that man should not interfere with karma.
Refuge is not a refuge from suffering
While I will probably take grief for this, I think Lockwood Kipling presents a more rational and accurate portrait of animal relationships in India. As he notes “They are admirable points in the ritual respect for life….Village boys are not there seen stoning frogs or setting dogs at cats, nor tying kettles to dogs’ tails, and it has not been found necessary to forbid birdnesting by Act of Parliament.” (X250) Kipling gives India a lot of credit, the West can learn a lot about respecting living things, violence should not be the first action. However Kipling also presents them in a rational light. There is violence in other parts of Indian culture. Austyn criticized Kipling for misrepresenting sacrifices to the goddess Kali, but in fact Kali is a very violent goddess. She has 8 arms, each carrying a weapon, her skirt is made from human arms and she wears a necklace made of human heads. The point is that India is not a violent or lesser culture, but that it, like the west, like all cultures possess some good philosophies, but ones that must still be challenged and rationalized.
John Lockwood drawing of a cow in India
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