In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

187 11 Negotiating Karma, Merit, and Liberation: Vow-taking in the Jain Tradition M. WHITNEY KELTING Lay Jains negotiate the terrain between the path of karma reduction leading to liberation and the acquisition of merit that fosters familial well-being. The nature of Jain vows balances on the fulcrum between vow-taking as a step on the way to karma reduction and ultimately spiritual liberation, and vowtaking as a key element in familial well-being; this can be seen as a negotiation between mendicant liberation ideologies and vow-taking as a part of a valid path of lay religiosity. This discussion will examine a very popular fast, the Ayambil Oli fast, which is widely undertaken for the well-being of the family and the Updhan during which the participants adopt a lifestyle similar to that of the mendicants both to decrease karma and to explicitly indicate their increased involvement in orthodox Jainism.1 The divide between the goals of liberation and well-being in Jain traditions is challenged in Cort’s work (2001); here, the intermingling of these two goals is clearly demonstrated by the crossover in the explanations of why one should undertake these vows and both the stated and apparent results of these vows. Simply put, vows are an agreement to do or not do something, in the context of a connection (even if one-sided) between a particular individual and This chapter is based in part on research conducted with the generous support of the American Institute of Indian Studies and St. Lawrence University. I want to thank Bill Harman and Selva Raj for including me in this volume and John Cort and Steve Runge for reading this in earlier forms and giving me helpful suggestions. 188 M. Whitney Kelting some being (deity, saint, teacher, relative) who has authority over that individual to approve or disapprove of his or her actions, with the expectation of a particular possible result. For Jains there are a number of acts that fall under the rubric of vow-taking. Jains use many terms to name the phenomenon of vows, most commonly vrat—or in Sanskrit and Prakrit, vrata—(observance) and tap (austerity ). Generally vrata are vows clearly intended to lead toward liberation and are based in mendicant praxis, and tap are complex temporary fasting vows. These vows include the vows taken as a basic statement of Jain identity, the vows undertaken by mendicants, special lay vows taken in parallel with mendicants , lifelong modifications of lay vows, particular vows associated with fasts, and a variety of other austerities. The vows, which are undertaken by mendicants and by lay people in imitation of mendicants, are all understood to be liberationdirected vows—vows with the stated goal of liberation. Jain vows are significant as markers of one’s level of dedication to Jain ethics and as an indication of the general support of Jain practice by one’s family. It is understood that all Jains will at some time or another participate in vow-taking though for most Jains this means taking short and relatively easy fasting vows. The kinds of vows discussed later in this chapter are understood to mark substantial religious dedication and single out the vow-takers as particularly pious Jains. These vows are also more theologically complex as they work simultaneously to reduce karma and to increase merit. Jainism in Brief A quick introduction to Jainism will set my discussion in its context. My research is conducted primarily with Gujarati- and Marwari-speaking Shvetambar Murtipujak Jains in Pune District, Maharashtra. Jains are a minority religious community clustered primarily in western India with a smaller cluster in south India.2 There are two distinct mendicant lineages (and lay devotees who are associated with them) in Jainism, the Shvetambar (lit., “white clad”) identified with southern Rajasthan, Gujarat, and the Bombay area of Maharashtra and the Digambar (“sky-clad”), clustered primarily in Rajasthan, southern Maharashtra and Karnataka. Scholars date the religious movements that are collectively called Jainism from the life of Mahavir, who was teaching in approximately the sixth century BCE. Jains see Mahavir as the most recent of twenty-four enlightened teachers (hereafter, Jinas) who have come to revitalize the Jain faith in this era.3 Jains describe themselves as a four-fold community of monks, nuns, laymen, and laywomen. The mendicants (monks and nuns) follow a strict regimen of asceticism modeled (more or less) on the accounts of the lives of the Jinas and the instructions for mendicants attributed to Mahavir...

Share