austerities these last karma are destroyed and break 'like a piece of burnt-up string', the soul loses its body and becomes a Siddha.
The Siddha has the following characteristics: absolute knowledge, faith, insight, righteousness, and prowess. He also has the power of becoming minute and gigantic at will, and of moving anywhere unhindered; he is unaffected by anything, so that neither death, disease, rebirth, nor sorrow can any longer touch him. He is also without a body; and this is the reason why Jaina feel they can never pray to a Siddha. A Siddha has, however, one hundred and eight attributes, and these the Jaina recite, telling their rosary of one hundred and eight beads. An ordinary Jaina tells his beads five times a day, but a very devout Jaina might tell the one hundred and eight beads one hundred and eight times a day. The Jaina say they do not worship or salute the Siddha when doing this, but tell their beads only with the object of stirring up their spiritual ambition and in order to remind themselves of the qualities a Siddha must possess, in the hope that some day they too may reach their desired goal, and rest in perfect bliss in the state of Nirvāṇa, doing nothing for ever and ever.
How even non-Jaina may reach Mokṣa.
One of the unique glories of Jainism is that it, unlike most Indian-born religions, believes in the possibility of aliens reaching its goal. Even Europeans and Americans,[1] although they may never have heard of Jainism, if they follow, though unconsciously, the thirty-five rules of conduct, of necessity destroy their karma and so are sped to mokṣa like an arrow from a bow.
It will therefore be well worth our while to study these
- ↑ Quite uncivilized races might reach mokṣa, but it would be easier for Europeans and other civilized people, provided they were vegetarians, to do so.
