Jainism and Hinduism By Amar Salgia
Are Jains actually Hindus? Is
Jainism an offshoot of Hinduism?
The nineteenth century introduction of the term "Hinduism" is today the source
for a variety of confusions and misguided scholarly pursuits among Indians and
Westerners alike. Based upon the sum of all extant historical
sources, including those from both traditional histories and living traditions,
the right answer to these questions is a categorical *no*. Many works of
scholarship have examined the historical, literary and doctrinal evidences
demonstrating that Jain tradition began anterior to and independent of the Vedic
and later Hindu traditions. The reader may be referred to Jyoti Prasad
Jain's book entitled **Jainism: The Oldest Living Religion** (1988:
P.V. Research Institute, Varanasi) for an introduction. Here, instead, the
conceptual basis the views in question shall be examined. Their sources
first need to be studied.
It is important to recognize upfront that neither Jains nor Hindus -- be they
scholars, swamis, pundits, monks or the like -- ever treated Jainism as a
subsect of Hinduism until the twentieth century: the era of Hindu
proselytization and nationalist politics. It was not until noted Hindu
thinkers, including the famed Swami Vivekananda, Mahatma Gandhi and Paramahansa
Yogananda, proclaimed to the Western world that India is a single nation of
common spirituality, that many other Hindu thinkers assumed a new posture of
sectarian hegemony: the "offshoot" mentality,
which has become a staple of post-independence Hindu thought. Contemporary
Hindu thinkers credit "Hinduism" for everything positive and acclaimed that ever
originated in India, including such things as moral virtues, philosophy,
language, science and art. Beginning in the 1960's, with the importations
of popular guru-followings into Europe and North America, Hindu scholars have
attempted to define and systematize Hinduism into a more or less united creed,
often by assimilating it to the familiar Judeo-Christian faiths, while claiming
greater perfection on the basis of its being more ancient, liberal,
"open-minded" and all-encompassing: a belief-system whose lack of
definition and consistency is somehow its crowning virtue. Hindu religious
teachers make attempts to supplant other world religions by conforming them to
the terminology of "Jnan yoga" (grace through the intellect), "Karma yoga"
(grace through works), and "Bhakti yoga" (grace through devotion), as delineated
in the much-revered **Bhagavad Gita**. Jainism and Buddhism, so it is
often suggested, constitute Karma yoga and therefore derive from Hinduism.
When dealing with the question of whether or not Jains are actually Hindus, one
must not only define a "Jain" but also define "Hindu". Since the field of
comparative religion began its development as a social science in the West, the
catchall of "Hinduism" has been applied in common reference to Brahmanism, or
the Vedic creed, along with any other religious traditions -- however mutually
contradictory -- which came to accept Vedic scriptural authority in some form.
Revisionists are proposing new Hindu self-conceptions such as the following from
**Dancing with Siva:
Hinduism's Contemporary Catechism**:
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From the rich soil of Hinduism long ago sprang various other
traditions. Among them were Jainism, Buddhism and Sikhism, which
rejected the *Vedas* and thus emerged as completely distinct
religions, disassociated from Hinduism, while still sharing many
philosophical insights and cultural values with their parent
faith.[1]
-----
"Hindu" is a term used by modern Indians mainly in a cultural sense (e.g., Hindu
vs. Muslim); or alternately, in reference to a national identity (the state of
Hindustan); or, when augmented with the suffix '-ism', in a vague
sense of religious creed (the "Hindu faith" or Sanatana Dharma). While
each approach might seem unambiguous by itself, the problem arises from the fact
that Indians tend to use these definitions interchangeably, even within a single
discourse. Frequently one hears that Hinduism is the whole of Indian
culture; that Hinduism is not a religion, but a way of life; or that a Hindu is
any inhabitant of India. Out of those three statements only the last
elicits the actual etymology of the word. *Hindu* is the Avestan (Old
Persian) rendering of *Sindhu*, the term used throughout most
of the first millennium, B.C. by the Irani-Aryans to differentiate themselves
from the Aryans inhabiting the lands east of the Sindhu River (the Indus River
in modern Pakistan).[2] In the fourth century, B.C., the invading Greeks
converted the name of their newly conquered land from the Persian "Hind" to
"India". Thus, anyone whose ancestors were among the Aryans that migrated
east of the modern Indus River (that is, any person of Indo-Aryan descent) can
logically call oneself a "Hindu" (that is, if the individual chooses to accept a
foreign ethnic designator).
So what is *Hinduism*? As we know it in the modern world, Hinduism is
actually made from the historical synthesis of two independent families of
religious traditions: on one hand, the faith, scripture, social structure
and ritualism of the *Brahmanic* (or Vedic) tradition; and on the other hand,
the introspectiveness, asceticism, philosophies and
conservativeness of the *Shramanic* traditions. This synthesis began
around 900 B.C. when the Vedic tribes of Indo-Aryans began to migrate from the
northern tributaries of the Indus River to the Shramanic homelands surrounding
the Ganges River (in the modern Indian states of Bihar and Uttar Pradesh).
The first definitive product of Hinduism's development was the collection of
books known as the *Upanishads* (600 - 300 B.C.), within which numerous
non-Vedic ideas begin to transform the earlier Vedic theology into the first
utterances of Hindu thought.[3] Jainism and other Shramanic systems were
among the original sources of these non-Vedic beliefs and soteriological
practices which have, up to modern times (and especially since the nineteenth
century), become synonymous with a popularized concept of Hinduism. Such
ideas included the concepts of karma, reincarnation, asceticism, belief in an
eternal soul, and a non-anthrocentric view of universe -- all of which are
absent from the original corpus of Vedic thought. Owing to the
liberalities of the older Vedic henotheism, and during the same initial stages
of Hinduism's evolution, more localized divinity-cults (e.g., those of the Shiva
and Krishna precursors), apart from the Shramanic and Vedic
traditions, were also assimilated into the Brahmanic belief and social systems.
Through the cultural processes involved in Sanskritizing them, the Brahmanic
fold started to reconfigure these regional cults and non-Vedic doctrines, absorb
them into its established structures, and therewith extend the geographical
limits of its cultural and linguistic
influence.[4] From these interactions, and within a changing Brahmanic
society, a hybrid Vedic/non-Vedic culture began to grow in both complexity and,
over centuries, in its capacity to socially interface with purely non-Vedic
religious traditions (such as Jainism).
Now, in the religious sense of the term, can one distinguish between that which
is Hindu and that which is not? Certainly: all religions and schools
of thought which support the authority of the Veda are *Hindu* religions and
*Hindu* schools of thought; and all those which do not are considered non-Vedic,
non-Brahmanic, and yes, non-Hindu.
Jainism and Buddhism (in addition to being purely Shramanic philosophies) would
thereby fall into the non-Hindu category. Thus, while the ancient Samkhya
philosophy shared numerous similarities with Jainism, and although
it originated from the realm of Shramanic thought, the early Samkhya thinkers
chose to acknowledge Vedic authority; and hence the Samkhya school has been
accepted as an "orthodox" system of *Hindu* philosophy, rather than an
independent or non-Vedic school of thought. Jainism on the other hand,
along with Buddhism and the ancient Ajivikas, have been labeled "heterodox" by
religious scholars as though they each developed from Hinduism (that is, from a
conflux of Vedic and non-Vedic beliefs) only to break from it in reaction to an
unsatisfying Hindu orthodoxy.
It is a fact that Jainism originated
on the Indian subcontinent. Its active adherents now number but a few
millions, whose mostly Indian members bear racial and cultural constitutions
that differ not outstandingly with surrounding populations. Over the
course of centuries, Indian lay Jains have, as part of a social survival
mechanism, adopted a
number of rites and customs bearing outward similarities with popular Hindu
rites and customs. In fact, it has been well-documented that for the very
purpose of reducing their cultural conspicuousness (primarily to avoid religious
persecution) the Jain laity, under monastic guidance, appropriated a variety of
devotional rituals (in addition to those
pertaining to marriage) which were deliberate modelings of established Brahmanic
rituals.[5] And since the Jain, Hindu and Buddhist traditions have
employed a generic Sanskritic vocabulary that includes "karma", "dharma", "samsara",
"yoga" and "moksha" -- despite the fact that each system defines them in terms
of fundamentally disparate worldviews -- a reductionistic stance has
propagated among Indians whereby each tradition has come to be viewed as part of
a monolithic, pan-Indian, "Hindu" phenomenon.
Nationalists thus argue that to draw distinctions in the spectrum of Indian
thought is to distort Indian culture and promote divisions in the Indian
republic. On a polemic front they allege that Hinduism, Jainism, Buddhism
and all other religions of Indian origin began from a single, primordially
unified Hindu people (usually imagined as a "Vedic
spiritual society"); and further that any distinctions between the religions are
merely differences in emphasis and preference, rather than purport. Some
state that while the Brahmanic traditions adopted many features of Shramanic,
Buddhist or Jain ideology, the Jain and Buddhist traditions, on the other hand,
began to modify and incorporate Hindu
deities into their histories and rituals -- the ready conclusion being that all
traditions of Indian origin are completely interdependent, and thus
unapproachable without a contrived ideological context linking each to all of
the others. Perceptions of certain types of similarities between
traditions, such as those of terminology, ethics or ritual, are
typically presented as proof for one tradition being a derivative of another
(usually the one with more professed adherents). In attempting to foster
for Jains a greater sense of belonging to an independent Indian nation, in the
1990's even Jain commentators have begun harboring a view of their tradition
wherein the last Tirthankara, Mahavira, is described not in the traditional
sense but as a champion of an imagined Hindu reformation. Due to similar
approaches it has become common for world philosophy and comparative religion
texts to classify Jainism as a "Hindu
tradition", while attempting little more discussion of its teachings beyond
general associations with Hinduism or Buddhism.
What the proponents of this view do not recognize, however, are the mostly
unilateral directions which these influences between Brahmanic and Shramanic
traditions have historically taken. While ideologies from the Shramanic
traditions, in the forms of metaphysics and soteriology, took hold and
germinated within the mainstreams of Brahmanic thought, the latter has had
insignificant if any impact on the Shramanic philosophies; and while a
worshipful attitude toward selections from the Hindu pantheon became gradually
accepted, though in modified form, by the popular sectors of the Buddhist and
Jain traditions, none of the major Hindu traditions have ever promoted an
analogous recognition for the Buddhas or Tirthankaras. (Although the
Vaishnava Hindu tradition did turn Buddha and the Tirthankara Rishabha into
"Vishnu-avataras", like the other minor incarnations they are neither deified
nor worshipped in any form.) Disregarding pre-formed conclusions, the literary
and doctrinal evidences most clearly relate that as religious ideology has
diffused to Brahmanism from the Shramanic realm, a *hybrid* culture formed from
these
interactions has come to dominate many of the empirical aspects of Indian life.
And it has been due to this manifested social dynamic that we might perceive
overt similarities between the Jain tradition and modern Hinduism:
similarities of ritual and terminology which arise from (1) the natural
commonalties that any hybrid culture would facilitate; and (2) the wide
diversity of non-Vedic philosophical ideas which (as exemplified by texts
including the Upanishads and Bhagavad Gita) merged into the amorphous
socio-religious system that we have only recently given the label of Hinduism.
The resemblances between Jainism and Hinduism, then, do not evince common
origins but are traceable to actual time periods and discrete events in history
wherein interactions were occurring between previously self-isolating
traditions. The historical independence of Jain philosophy, as a unique
hallmark of the non-Vedic tradition known as Jainism, thus remains unchallenged.
In summary, common claims such as "Jainism is an offshoot of Hinduism" and
"Buddha was a Hindu" are not supported by historical facts or sound
doctrinal comparisons. They are matters of perception (and largely
superficial perceptions at that) which typically draw upon observations of
shared social customs and the aforementioned ritualistic similarities.
They are fueled by inaccurate conceptions of *both* Jainism and Hinduism; and,
when professed in the guise of religious scholarship, such claims constitute
little more than religious chauvinism: the same chauvinism that modern
Hindu thinkers claim that Hinduism lacks. Were Mahavira and Buddha
charismatic populists? Were they the reformers of an already established
Hindu belief system? Are Jainism and Buddhism offshoots of Hinduism?
Were they each products of a "Hindu" socio-religious system? Many Hindu
thinkers allege just that and,
interestingly enough, do so in the face of powerful evidence to the
contrary from within the Brahmanic tradition itself. That evidence, when
coupled with the apparent need to supplant Jainism (along with the other
religions of Indian origin), continues to generate insupportable and
self-contradicting portrayals of the tradition. In a terse synopsis of
Jainism the author of **The Hindu Mind** provides an excellent example of this:
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Jainism, an offshoot of Hinduism, is believed to be as ancient as
the Vedic religion, since references to two of its twenty-four
saints (Tirthankaras), Rishabha and Arishtanemi, are found in the
Rigvedic Mantras. Rishabha, the first of the twenty-four
Tirthankaras, is the founder of the original Jain Dharma....
Jainism is one of the theological traditions (sampradayas)
of Hinduism and is classified as one of the heterodox schools of
Hindu philosophy....Jainism rejects the ritualistic content of the
Vedas but does not necessarily deny their higher teachings.[6]
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How the Jain religion, having been founded by Rishabha, can be "as ancient" as
the Vedas and yet still be an "offshoot" of Hinduism is among the revisionists'
standard paradoxes. Unsubstantiated by ancient traditions or actual texts
which might lend support to the notion, the author's appropriation of Jainism as
a Hindu "sampradaya" is also a recent
innovation. (As a point of information, no final authority is recognized
in Jainism beyond the *Kevalin*, or omniscient soul. Jainism accepts
nothing from the Vedic, Vedantic or later Hindu scriptures and recognizes none
of the beliefs contained in them as authoritative. For well over 2500
years Jain tradition has been consistently clear on that point.)
The claim that Jainism began from
Hinduism is therefore little more than a claim. Bearing semantic
difficulties which alone preclude its defense, it is an assertion best-suited
for furthering social and political agendas; and a belief relying, for its
general acceptance, upon ignorance of the historical, literary and doctrinal
evidences to the contrary (along with the passivity of the Jain community in
affirming otherwise). In recent decades some proponents of the "Jains are
Hindus" view have assumed patronizing, even antagonistic dispositions towards
any notion of Jainism's uniqueness or historical independence. One could
begin a more public process of debunking the offshoot-paradigm by addressing the
antagonists with a simple line of questions:
* First, define "Hindu" and "Hinduism".
* Based on those definitions, and using both historical and
doctrinal evidence, explain *how* Jain philosophy was
derived from the Brahmanic faith; and, based on that evidence, *how* you
deduce that Jains are and have always been a subsect of Hindus, despite
the fact that the very notion is almost exclusively a twentieth century
phenomenon.
* In what ways do rituals and social customs have anything to do
with being a Jain and following the philosophy and code of conduct taught by
Lord Mahavira? Explicate the respective roles that rituals and social
customs assume within Jain cosmology and the philosophy of *Seven Tattvas*, both
of which constitute the sum of all that Jainism rests upon.
* Why is it important for Jains to be convinced that their own
religion is neither independent nor unique, but that it is somehow a child of
another religion? For what reasons must Jains deny and discard their
thousands of years of meticulously recorded pre-Mahaviran history, and replace
it with this twentieth century claim that "Jains are Hindus"? Do Jains who
identify themselves as "Hindu" rather than "Jain" gain any special
benefits from doing so?
* Do the Hindu deities symbolize the same ideals of passionlessness,
detachment and omniscience which are exemplified by the *Jina*? Should Jains
contradict their own intellectual and spiritual tradition and start praising the
Vedas, Upanishads, Bhagavad Gita and other major Hindu scriptures, despite the
set reasoning against doing so
articulated by Lord Mahavira and other Jain leaders
throughout every subsequent age?
* If Jains and Hindus are now, and have always been the same, then
why do Hindus thinkers not preach Jain philosophy; or teach from any of the Jain
scriptures; or endorse the Jain code of conduct; or worship the ideals embodied
as the Lord Jina? Why have Jain and Hindu thinkers been engaged in
vigorous ideological debates for well over twenty-five centuries?
Why did purist Brahmanic revivals, such as the Advaita and Bhakti
movements, condemn Jainism as a heretical creed?
________________________
1. Satguru Sivaya Subrahmuniyaswami. 1993:
Himalayan Academy,
Concord, CA. p. 731. Note
the author's reference to Hinduism as
a singular "parent faith".
2. Historical note: The Sanskrit word
"Aryan" or "Arya" is a proper
linguistic designation, and refers
strictly to those peoples who
speak or spoke any of the
Indo-Iranian languages which include
Sanskrit, Prakrit, Persian, Hindi,
Gujarati, Panjabi, Sindhi,
Pashto, and many others.
"Aryan" therefore supports no more of
racial connotation than the term
"Semite" (as the latter denotes
the native-born speaker of any
Semitic language).
3. Gavin Flood. **An Introduction to
Hinduism**. 1996: Cambridge
University Press. p. 40.
4. Ibid. p. 148.
5. Historical note: The beginnings of this
persecution came with the
Brahmanical ministry of Shankara, the ninth century founder of the
"Advaita", or Non-dualism movement which condemned non-Vedic systems
for being heretical creeds.
6. Bansi Pandit. 1996: B&V
Enterprises, Glen Ellyn (IL). pp. 87-90.