IA quick read in five sentences
Jainism, known in Vietnamese as Kỳ Na Giáo, is a religion of India that takes the vow of non-harm, in Sanskrit ahimsa, as the axis for everything else. Its followers call themselves Jains, meaning followers of the Jinas, the victors, where what is conquered is not an outside enemy but greed, anger, pride and deceit, the things that bind the soul to the cycle of birth and death. The most recent teacher is Mahavira, who lived at the same time and in the same region of Magadha as the Buddha, but the tradition holds that he did not found the religion: he is the twenty-fourth in a line of twenty-four Tirthankaras, those who build a ford for beings to cross the river of birth and death. The religion has no creator god. It teaches that each soul binds itself through karma and frees itself through practice, and it regards karma as a subtle kind of matter that clings to the soul. The two major traditions are the Digambara, whose male monks wear no clothes, and the Svetambara, whose monastics wear white. Jains today number about four to five million, nearly all of them in India, and the religion has no organisation in Vietnam.
One. There is no founder in the usual sense. The tradition tells of a line of twenty-four Tirthankaras repeated in every half-cycle of time, while history is sure only of the last two, Parshvanatha and Mahavira.
Two. Three words sum up the religion: ahimsa, non-harm, anekantavada, the doctrine of the many-sidedness of truth, and aparigraha, non-possession. The path to liberation is the Three Jewels of Jainism: right perception, right knowledge, right conduct.
Three. The soul, in Sanskrit jiva, is everywhere: in humans, animals, insects and plants, and even in earth, water, fire and air. That is why the Jain vow of non-harm is broader than that of almost any other religion.
Four. The Digambara and Svetambara traditions drifted apart over the first several centuries of the Common Era. They differ over the clothing of monastics, over scripture, and over whether a woman can attain liberation in a female body.
Five. The swastika is one of the religion's original symbols, present in the shared emblem of the Jain community, and it differs completely from the sign of the German Nazi Party in origin, meaning and form.
This page runs through fifteen sections. Where the tradition and the historical record tell things differently, as with the dates of Mahavira or the split between the two traditions, the page sets two boxes side by side. Where two sources give two figures, the page records both. One section is devoted to the swastika, and another places Jainism beside Buddhism so that you can see where these two contemporaries are alike and where they differ.
IIMagadha, the Shramana movement and the name
In the sixth and fifth centuries BC, the Ganges plain was changing fast: cities sprang up, merchants grew rich, and large kingdoms such as Magadha and Kosala swallowed the smaller tribes. Questions once answered by village sacrifice now had to be asked again. Jainism and Buddhism grew up in exactly this setting, on the same stretch of land around the cities of Vaishali, Rajagriha and Pava, and the scriptures of both religions mention Magadhan kings such as Bimbisara and Ajatashatru.
The Shramana movement
The dominant religious order of the time was Brahmanism, built on the Vedas and on sacrificial rites controlled by the Brahmin class. Set against it were those known collectively as shramanas, in Sanskrit sramana, meaning those who strive: they left home, lived on alms, rejected the authority of the Vedas, and sought liberation through their own practice rather than through sacrifice. The movement gave rise to many groups, and the only two still alive today are Jainism and Buddhism.
The shramana group that followed the Tirthankaras, stressing asceticism and thoroughgoing non-harm. The Buddhist scriptures in Pali call the head of this group Nigantha Nataputta.
The shramana group that followed Shakyamuni Buddha, choosing the middle way and avoiding both indulgence and self-mortification.
A shramana group led by Makkhali Gosala, which held that everything is determined by fate. Jain scriptures say Gosala travelled with Mahavira for many years and then parted from him. The group has since disappeared entirely.
The name
The word Jain comes from Jina जिन, meaning victor. The religion of the followers of the Jinas is called Jaina dharma, and Chinese transliterated the word Jaina as 耆那, which Vietnamese reads as Kỳ Na. The syllable Kỳ here is only a sound and carries no sense of strangeness. An older name is Nirgrantha निर्ग्रन्थ, meaning one without knots, that is, with nothing left to bind them. Pali renders the word as nigantha, and the Chinese translations of Buddhist scriptures transliterated it as 尼乾子, read in Sino-Vietnamese as Ni Kiền Tử. Vietnamese readers of Buddhist scripture have met this religion under that name for a very long time, even though few know that it is Jainism.
Jainism is not a branch that split off from Buddhism, nor a sect of Hinduism. All three religions share many words such as karma, rebirth and liberation, but Jainism has its own scriptures, its own monastics and its own temples, and regards itself as a tradition older even than Mahavira. The names Digambara and Svetambara do not denote two religions either: they are two traditions of the same religion, literally the sky-clad and the white-clad.
IIIMahavira and the twenty-four Tirthankaras
Tirthankara तीर्थंकर literally means ford-maker. The word tirtha denotes a shallow place in a river where people can wade across, and also the fourfold community of monks, nuns, laymen and laywomen. A Tirthankara is one who has crossed the stream of birth and death and then builds a ford for others to follow. Each half-cycle of time has exactly twenty-four of them, and in the present half-cycle the first is Rishabhanatha, also called Adinatha, and the last is Mahavira.
According to tradition, Mahavira's given name was Vardhamana, meaning the one who brings increase. He was born in Kundagrama near the city of Vaishali, to Siddhartha, a chieftain of the Nata clan, and his wife Trishala. Before his birth his mother saw a series of auspicious dreams, fourteen in the Svetambara account and sixteen in the Digambara account. At thirty he left home, gave up all his possessions and lived as an ascetic for twelve and a half years, fasting for long periods, meditating, and enduring heat, cold and insects without retaliating. At forty-two, beneath a sala tree on the bank of the Rijupalika river near the village of Jrimbhikagrama, he attained kevala jnana केवलज्ञान, complete knowledge no longer veiled by anything. For the next thirty years he preached throughout Magadha and gathered eleven chief disciples called ganadharas, headed by Indrabhuti Gautama. At seventy-two he attained nirvana at Pavapuri, on the night that Jains today commemorate at Diwali, and on that same night Gautama attained complete knowledge.
As for dates, the tradition places Mahavira at 599 to 527 BC, and the Vira Nirvana Samvat era used by Jains counts its years from that date of 527. Britannica notes that many scholars consider this date to be as much as a century too early. Paul Dundas places his death around 425 BC or a few years later, while Jeffery Long proposes around 499 to 427 BC. The dates of Mahavira are closely tied to those of the Buddha, because the Pali scriptures say Nigantha Nataputta died before the Buddha, and the Buddha's dates are not settled either. The most reliable evidence for his historical existence is the Buddhist scriptures themselves: a rival religion recorded his name, the place of his death and his teachings, which means he was real and well known in his day.
Parshvanatha, the twenty-third
The tradition places Parshvanatha at 877 to 777 BC, about two hundred and fifty years before Mahavira. Most historians place him later, in the 8th or 7th century BC, but many accept him as a historical figure. One piece of evidence often cited: Parshvanatha taught four vows rather than five, and the Pali scriptures themselves, when describing the teaching of Nigantha Nataputta, speak of a fourfold restraint. The Jain Uttaradhyayana also tells of a meeting between Kesi, a disciple in the line of Parshva, and Gautama, a disciple of Mahavira, in which the two compared and reconciled their two ways of keeping the vows. In other words, before Mahavira there was already a shramana community following Parshva, and Mahavira carried that community forward.
| Order | Name | Identifying emblem | Notes from the tradition |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Rishabhanatha, also called Adinatha | Bull | The first of the present half-cycle, said to have taught humankind farming, writing and the crafts. Attained nirvana on Mount Ashtapada. |
| 7 | Suparshvanatha | Swastika | This Tirthankara's emblem is the swastika itself, one of the reasons the sign holds such a large place in the religion. |
| 16 | Shantinatha | Deer | The name means lord of peace, and he is much invoked by those seeking calm and safety. |
| 19 | Mallinatha | Water jar | The Svetambara tradition says this Tirthankara was a woman named Malli. The Digambara tradition venerates a man. This is a major point of difference between the two traditions. |
| 22 | Neminatha | Conch shell | Attained nirvana on Mount Girnar in Gujarat. |
| 23 | Parshvanatha | Snake | Attained nirvana on the summit at Sammed Shikharji. Accepted by many historians as a historical figure. |
| 24 | Mahavira | Lion | Attained nirvana at Pavapuri. The most recent, whom the community today continues. |
Tirthankaras are not gods who grant blessings. The tradition holds that they are liberated, have left the world, do not hear prayers and do not intervene in human life. Jains go to the temple to look at a model of someone who has reached the goal and to remind themselves to walk that path. In practice there are guardian deities such as Padmavati, Ambika or Chakreshvari whom people petition for worldly matters, but these are gods still within the cycle of rebirth, ranked below the Tirthankaras, and many Jain monastics remind the faithful to keep the two levels clearly apart.
IVTwo and a half thousand years on a timeline
The further back one goes, the wider the range of dates. The dates below follow the tradition where only the tradition exists, and give both figures where two sources disagree.
- 9th to 7th century BCParshvanathaThe tradition gives 877 to 777 BC, while most historians place him in the 8th or 7th century. He taught four vows to the shramana community that followed him.
- 6th to 5th century BCMahavira preaches in MagadhaThe tradition gives 599 to 527 BC, while many scholars move this later by about a century. He added a fifth vow, celibacy, and established the fourfold community.
- 4th to 3rd century BCBhadrabahu and the migration southThe Digambara tradition says that during a twelve-year famine in Magadha, the elder Bhadrabahu led a group of monks down to the Karnataka region, and King Chandragupta Maurya went with them and died at Shravanabelagola. Historians treat this as tradition, not yet confirmed in full detail by contemporary evidence.
- around the 4th or 3rd century BCThe council of PataliputraAccording to the Svetambara tradition, monks met at Pataliputra to gather the eleven Angas then being transmitted orally. The Digambara tradition does not accept the results of this council.
- 1st to 2nd centuryThe Jain stupa at MathuraExcavations at the Kankali Tila mound in Mathura found the base of a Jain stupa and many Kushan-era inscriptions naming donors, many of them women. This is among the earliest and richest material evidence for the religion.
- around 80The two traditions drift apartThe Svetambara date is 609 years after Mahavira's nirvana, around the year 82. A 10th-century Digambara text gives 136 years into the Vikrama era, around the year 79 or 80. Scholarship today sees this as a process spanning several centuries rather than a single day.
- 2nd to 5th centuryTattvartha SutraUmasvati composed a Sanskrit text summarising the whole of the teaching, the only one accepted by both traditions. Its date of composition still ranges from the 2nd to the 5th century.
- 453 or 466The council of ValabhiUnder the leadership of Devarddhigani Kshamashramana, Svetambara monks committed the Agamas to writing. Ancient sources give the year 980 or 993 after Mahavira's nirvana, which converts to 453 or 466 CE.
- 981 to 983The great statue at ShravanabelagolaThe statue of Bahubali, carved from a single block of granite on Vindhyagiri hill and standing about 17 metres high, was commissioned by Chavundaraya, a minister of the Western Ganga dynasty. Sources differ on the year of completion within the range 981 to 983.
- 1031 and 1230The Dilwara temples at Mount AbuThe Vimal Vasahi temple to Rishabhanatha was built in 1031 and the Luna Vasahi temple to Neminatha in 1230, both of white marble densely carved.
- 15th centuryLonka Shah and the non-image-worshipping currentThe layman Lonka Shah of Ahmedabad opposed image worship on the basis of a fresh reading of the scriptures. Sources give different dates, some 1451, others around 1476. From here the Sthanakvasi tradition later took shape.
- 1760The Terapanthi Svetambara traditionAcharya Bhikshu, born 1726, died 1803, left the Sthanakvasi tradition to found the Terapanthi tradition in Rajasthan, in the year usually cited as 1760.
- 1893Jainism at the World's Parliament of ReligionsIn Chicago, the lawyer Virchand Gandhi presented Jainism to a Western audience, at the same parliament where Buddhist delegates spoke there for the first time.
- 1974 or 1975A shared emblem and the 2,500th anniversary of Mahavira's nirvanaThe traditions agreed on a common emblem for the whole community. The 2015 proposal to encode Jain symbols in Unicode gives 1974, while Wikipedia gives 1975. The same occasion produced the anthology Saman Suttam, agreed on by the various traditions.
VCore teachings
Jain teaching is a tight system, almost a map: what exists in the universe, how the soul is bound, how it is freed, and where the soul goes once it is free. This section takes each piece in turn, in the order used by the Tattvartha Sutra itself.
Soul and non-soul
Jainism divides everything real into two: jiva, the soul, that which knows and feels, and ajiva, that which has no soul. Souls are countless, each living being has its own, and every soul by nature possesses infinite knowledge, infinite perception, infinite bliss and infinite energy. A soul has no fixed size but expands and contracts to fit the body it inhabits, like a lamp that lights a small room when placed in a small room and a large room when placed in a large one. This is where Jainism differs from Buddhism at the root: Jainism affirms an eternal soul, Buddhism teaches non-self.
Non-soul consists of five kinds, which together with soul make up the six substances of the universe. Pudgala is matter, made of atoms. Dharma here does not mean religious teaching but the medium of motion, like water for a swimming fish. Adharma is the medium of rest, like the shade of a tree where a traveller stops. Akasha is space. Kala is time, which some in the Svetambara tradition do not count as a separate substance. No substance is created and none is destroyed. They only change form.
Life everywhere
Jain scriptures classify living beings by the number of their senses. One-sensed beings have only touch and fall into five groups: earth-bodied, water-bodied, fire-bodied, air-bodied and plants. This means a grain of earth, a drop of water or a flame is also the body of very tiny living beings. Two-sensed beings include worms and grubs. Three-sensed beings include ants. Four-sensed beings include bees and flies. Five-sensed beings include animals, birds, fish, humans, gods and hell beings. This classification is not mere theory: it shapes how Jains eat, drink, walk, speak and earn a living, as the later sections show.
Karma is a kind of matter
This is the most distinctive feature of Jainism. For Buddhism, karma is intentional action. For Jainism, karma is made of subtle particles of matter drifting throughout the universe, drawn into the soul whenever the soul is stirred by passion, and then clinging to it like dust to an oiled cloth. That oil is the four passions called kashaya: anger, pride, deceit and greed. The stronger the passion, the thicker and longer the karma clings. Thickly clinging karma obscures the soul's innate infinite knowledge and drags the soul from one rebirth to another.
Karma is divided into eight types, gathered into two groups. The four destructive types obscure the qualities of the soul: the type that veils knowledge, the type that veils perception, the type that deludes and the type that obstructs energy. The four non-destructive types determine the circumstances of the body: feelings of pleasure and pain, lifespan, the kind of body one is born into, and one's status in life. A person who attains complete knowledge is free of the first four types but retains the latter four until the end of that life, and only then is fully liberated.
Jain scriptures teach that each person's mind is tinged with a colour according to the passion that governs it, called leshya. There are six colours. The three dark ones are black, indigo blue and the grey of a dove's feathers. The three bright ones are usually described as red like fire, yellow like a lotus, and white. The more violent the mind, the darker the colour, and the calmer the mind, the brighter the colour. White belongs to one whose mind is completely still.
Seven truths and the way to shed karma
The teaching is packed into seven truths, called tattva. There is soul and there is non-soul. Karma flows into the soul through the activity of body, speech and mind. Karma binds to the soul because of passion. New karma can be stopped through discipline and vigilance. Old karma can be worn away through austerity, above all fasting and meditation. And when all karma is exhausted, the soul is liberated. The Svetambara tradition usually adds merit and demerit to make nine. The whole religion can be understood as a technique of shutting the door against dust and then wiping away the dust that has already settled.
The Three Jewels
The opening line of the Tattvartha Sutra says the path to liberation is right perception, right knowledge and right conduct together. Jainism calls these three the ratnatraya, the three jewels. Right perception is rightly accepting the seven truths. Right knowledge is understanding them without error, gap or doubt. Right conduct is living by the vows. Lacking any one of the three, one does not reach the goal, just as curing an illness needs trust in the doctor, knowledge of the medicine and actually taking it.
Ahimsa, non-harm
Ahimsa अहिंसा is the first vow and the root of all the others. The Acaranga, one of the oldest scriptures, has an often-quoted line: all living beings love their lives, desire comfort, dislike pain, do not wish to be killed, and long to live. Therefore one must not kill, must not cause others to kill, and must not approve of killing. Jain non-harm covers body, speech and mind alike: a wounding word or a cruel thought is also harm, and harming others first harms one's own soul, because it attracts more karma.
Jainism distinguishes degrees. Monastics keep non-harm fully towards all beings, including one-sensed ones. Lay people cannot live without causing any harm at all, so they keep it at a lower level: never intentionally harming beings with two or more senses, and keeping harm to one-sensed beings to a minimum. This is why, historically, Jains avoided farming, which requires tilling the soil and killing insects, avoided fishing, and concentrated in trade, banking and jewellery.
Anekantavada, the many-sidedness of truth
Anekantavada अनेकान्तवाद literally means the doctrine of non-one-sidedness. Reality has countless aspects, and every statement made by someone without complete knowledge is true only from one standpoint. The familiar parable is the blind men and the elephant: the one who touches the trunk says the elephant is like a snake, the one who touches a leg says it is like a pillar, the one who touches an ear says it is like a fan. Each is partly right, and each is wrong in taking his part for the whole. The story is also found in Buddhist scripture, but Jainism builds a whole method of logic upon it.
That method is called syadvada स्याद्वाद, the doctrine of maybe, where the word syat means from a certain point of view. Every proposition is examined in seven forms: from one point of view it is, from one point of view it is not, from one point of view it both is and is not, from one point of view it is inexpressible, and three combined forms. A clay pot, considered by its substance, is earth. Considered by its shape, it is a pot. Considered at this moment, it exists. Considered a hundred years from now, it does not. Jains regard anekantavada as non-harm in thought: not forcing one's own views on others.
Anekantavada is not a relativism in which anything goes. Jainism affirms that there is absolute truth, and those who have attained complete knowledge see it. What the doctrine says is that ordinary people see only in part and therefore need humility, not that all views are equal.
Aparigraha, non-possession
Aparigraha अपरिग्रह is non-attachment, both to external things and to passions within the mind. Monastics give up all their possessions, keeping only a few items needed for practice, and Digambara monks give up even their clothes. Lay people vow to set a limit on their own wealth, and whatever exceeds that limit they give as offerings or to charity. This is one reason the Jain community is known for building rest houses for pilgrims, animal hospitals and charitable foundations.
A universe created by no one
Jainism has no creator god. The universe, called loka, has existed without beginning and will continue without end, running by the natural laws of the six substances. The loka has a bounded shape, broad at the bottom, narrow in the middle and flaring at the top, and is divided into three worlds: the upper world of the gods, the middle world where humans live, and the lower world made up of the levels of hell. Beyond the loka lies completely empty space. At the top of the loka is a crescent-shaped region called Siddhashila, where liberated souls remain forever.
Time turns as a wheel. Each cycle consists of an ascending half and a descending half, each half made up of six eras. The tradition holds that we are in the fifth era of the descending half, which began shortly after Mahavira's nirvana and lasts twenty-one thousand years. In this era no one in our part of the world can attain full liberation, and practitioners can only build up their progress so as to come closer to the goal in later lives.
Liberation
When the soul is cleansed of all karma, it rises of itself to the top of the universe, like a dried gourd that floats to the surface once all its coating of mud has fallen away, and remains at Siddhashila, enjoying in full its four innate infinite qualities. A liberated soul is called a siddha. One who has attained complete knowledge while still living is called an arihant, and the Tirthankaras are arihants who founded a community. The path from delusion to liberation is divided into fourteen stages called gunasthana, like a ladder the soul climbs step by step, sometimes slipping down and climbing again.
VIThe Agamas and the shared texts
Mahavira's words were memorised and handed down orally by the ganadharas, and are known collectively as the Agamas. They are in Ardhamagadhi, a form of Prakrit from the Magadha region, not in Sanskrit. Among them were fourteen Purvas, the oldest texts, which both traditions agree have been lost. The two traditions differ over the rest: the Svetambara believe most of the Agamas were preserved and written down at the council of Valabhi, while the Digambara believe the entire original canon was gradually lost by around the 2nd century CE.
| Tradition | Accepted scriptures | Number of texts | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Image-worshipping Svetambara, the Murtipujaka | Agamas: 11 Angas, 12 Upangas, 6 Chedasutras, 4 Mulasutras, 2 Culikasutras, plus miscellaneous texts | 45 | Written down at the council of Valabhi in 453 or 466. The twelfth Anga has been lost. |
| Sthanakvasi and Terapanthi | Agamas, minus the texts they regard as lacking authority | 32 | These two traditions do not worship images and so do not accept texts whose content concerns image worship. |
| Digambara | The Shatkhandagama of Pushpadanta and Bhutabali, the Kasayapahuda of Gunadhara, and the works of Kundakunda such as the Samayasara | No fixed number | The first two date from around the 2nd to 3rd century. The Digambara arrange their scriptures into four groups called the four anuyogas. |
| All traditions | The Tattvartha Sutra of Umasvati | 1 | In Sanskrit, ten chapters, dated anywhere from the 2nd to the 5th century. The only text accepted by both traditions. |
Of that whole collection, the most widely read text is the Tattvartha Sutra. Umasvati packed the entire system into short Sanskrit aphorisms, opening with the line that right perception, right knowledge and right conduct are the path to liberation. A line from chapter five, परस्परोपग्रहो जीवानाम्, transliterated parasparopagraho jivanam, meaning living beings support one another, was later chosen as the motto beneath the religion's shared emblem.
The Acaranga, the first Anga, is regarded by scholars as one of the oldest layers of scripture, recording the monastic rules and the ascetic life of Mahavira. The Kalpa Sutra records the lives of the Tirthankaras and is read aloud during the Paryushana festival in many Svetambara temples. On the Digambara side, Kundakunda's Samayasara discusses the soul from the absolute standpoint and is regarded as the most important book for inner practice. Beyond scripture there is a large literature in Tamil, Kannada and Gujarati, and even mathematical works such as the Ganitasarasangraha, composed by Mahaviracharya around 850.
The recitation every Jain knows by heart is the Namokar Mantra, also called Navkar, in Prakrit. Its first five lines are: णमो अरिहंताणं, homage to the arihants. णमो सिद्धाणं, homage to the siddhas. णमो आयरियाणं, homage to the heads of the orders. णमो उवज्झायाणं, homage to the teachers of scripture. णमो लोए सव्व साहूणं, homage to all monastics in the world. The recitation names no one and asks for nothing, it only pays homage to qualities, and that is why both traditions recite it.
VIIThe Digambara and Svetambara traditions
Jainism has two major traditions, and within each there are smaller branches. Digambara दिगम्बर means one who takes the four directions as clothing. Svetambara श्वेताम्बर means one who wears white. The most visible difference is the clothing of monastics, but the deeper differences concern scripture, women, and whether an omniscient being still eats and drinks.
| Point | Digambara | Svetambara |
|---|---|---|
| Clothing of male monastics | None, because clothing is a possession and must be washed, which harms tiny living beings | Unstitched white garments |
| Female monastics | Wear white, and according to this tradition cannot attain liberation in a female body | Wear white, and can attain liberation in a female body |
| Mallinatha, the nineteenth | Male | Female, named Malli |
| Scripture | The original canon is lost. Uses the Shatkhandagama, the Kasayapahuda and the works of Kundakunda | Accepts the Agamas written down at Valabhi, 45 or 32 texts depending on the branch |
| Life of Mahavira | Never married | Had a wife, Yashoda, and a daughter, Priyadarshana |
| The omniscient being | No longer eats or drinks | Still eats and drinks like an ordinary person |
| Regions with many followers | Karnataka, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, part of Rajasthan | Gujarat, Rajasthan, and most of the diaspora community |
Each tradition has its own story of when the two sides parted. The Digambara say that during a twelve-year famine in Magadha, the elder Bhadrabahu led part of the monastic community south and kept the practice of going without clothes, while the group that stayed behind under Sthulabhadra began, because of circumstances, to wear white, and then kept that habit. The Svetambara tell it the other way round: a monk named Shivabhuti, around 609 years after Mahavira's nirvana, disagreed with his teacher, discarded his clothes and started the practice of going unclothed. The Svetambara further hold that both Bhadrabahu and Sthulabhadra were white-clad monks, which the Digambara reject.
History does not take sides. Inscriptions at Mathura from the Kushan period show that by around the 1st and 2nd centuries there were Jain monks described as wearing a single piece of cloth, which means differences in clothing were present early on. Scholarship today sees the split as a process that hardened gradually over many centuries, with the council of Valabhi in the 5th century, where the Svetambara wrote down their scriptures without Digambara participation, as the moment the separation took clear shape.
Branches within each tradition
The largest Svetambara branch, which worships images of the Tirthankaras in temples and performs rites with eight kinds of offering. Many of the great temples of Gujarat and Rajasthan belong to this branch.
A Svetambara branch that does not worship images, rooted in the movement of the layman Lonka Shah in the 15th century and taking shape in the 17th century. Its members practise in halls called sthanak rather than in temples. Its monastics wear a mouth cloth all day.
Founded by Acharya Bhikshu around 1760, splitting from the Sthanakvasi. It does not worship images and is tightly organised under a single teacher who heads the entire tradition.
Two Digambara branches that differ over how images are worshipped and over the role of the teachers who manage the temples. The name Terapanthi here coincides with that of the Svetambara branch, but they are two different groups.
Outsiders often think all Jain monastics go unclothed. That is not true. Only male Digambara monks keep that practice, and they are a minority of all Jain monastics. Digambara nuns and all Svetambara monastics wear white. For the Digambara, giving up clothing is the final step of the vow of non-possession and carries no meaning of provocation or display.
VIIIThe swastika in Jainism and how it differs from the Nazi emblem
This section exists for a plain reason: the swastika is an original symbol of Jainism, and today's reader can very easily see it through the shadow of the twentieth century. For the Jain shrine in the Main Hall, the library chose the emblem of the hand of non-harm rather than the swastika, because a small emblem standing alone, without explanation, is very easily misread. In return, the body of the page must explain it clearly. This page describes the swastika only in words and does not print its character or its image.
Name and original meaning
Sanskrit calls this sign the svastika स्वस्तिक, from su, good or auspicious, and asti, it is, that is, the sign that good fortune is present. Vietnamese calls it chữ vạn, following Buddhist temple usage, meaning ten thousand blessings. Its shape in words: an upright cross, its arms parallel to the ground and to the edges of the page, with the end of each arm bent at a right angle in the same rotational direction. In Jainism the arms are usually bent clockwise.
For Jains, the four arms of the swastika are the four destinies into which a soul still wandering in the cycle of rebirth can be born: gods, humans, animals and plants, and hell beings. Above the swastika are three dots, the three jewels of right perception, right knowledge and right conduct, the path out of those four destinies. Higher still is a crescent moon, which is Siddhashila, and a dot above the crescent, which is the liberated soul. Read from the bottom up, the whole group forms one sentence: from the four paths of rebirth, through the three jewels, one rises to liberation. Another interpretation takes the four arms as the fourfold community of monks, nuns, laymen and laywomen.
The swastika in religious life
The swastika is the personal emblem of the seventh Tirthankara, carved beneath his pedestal.
In temple worship, especially among the Svetambara, worshippers arrange whole grains of rice into a swastika on a small table before the altar, place the three dots and the crescent above it, and then set their offerings on it.
The swastika is one of the eight auspicious signs, called ashtamangala, together with the water vessel, the mirror, the pair of fish and the others. The two traditions have slightly different lists of the eight.
An elaborate form of the swastika whose arms wind back on themselves many times. According to the Svetambara it is the emblem of the eighteenth Tirthankara, Aranatha.
The Jain flag has five coloured bands corresponding to the five ranks honoured in the Namokar recitation, with the swastika placed in the centre.
The religion's shared emblem
On the occasion of the 2,500th anniversary of Mahavira's nirvana, the Jain traditions agreed on a shared emblem. The two sources differ on the year: the 2015 proposal to encode Jain symbols in Unicode gives 1974, while Wikipedia gives 1975, and the anniversary observances spanned both years. The outline of the emblem is the shape of the loka, the universe as Jainism conceives it. Inside it are the swastika, the three dots, the crescent and the topmost dot just described. The lower half shows a raised hand, with a wheel of twenty-four spokes on the palm for the twenty-four Tirthankaras and the word ahimsa in the middle, meaning stop and think before causing harm. At the very bottom is the scriptural line that living beings support one another. The emblem of the Jain shrine in this library takes only that hand.
The swastika sign is older than any living religion. In South Asia it appears on seals of the Indus civilisation from around 3000 BC, at sites such as Mohenjo-daro. Further back still, a small figurine of mammoth ivory found at the Mezine site in Eastern Europe bears a pattern of interlinked swastikas, dated to around 10,000 to 17,000 BC. The sign appears in a great many cultures around the world with meanings of luck, the sun or rotation, and Jainism, Buddhism and Hinduism all inherited it from that shared cultural layer.
The emblem of the German Nazi Party, called the Hakenkreuz in German, literally the hooked cross, was used by that party from 1920. It is drawn tilted at forty-five degrees, standing on a corner rather than lying square, filled in black, set inside a white disc on a red field, and never accompanied by three dots or a crescent. The Jain swastika is set upright, usually drawn in vermilion, in yellow or in grains of rice, always paired with the three dots and the crescent, and carries the meaning of good fortune and the path to liberation. Rendering Hakenkreuz in English as swastika was a later translation choice, and it is part of what has merged the two signs into one. This difference is set out not to defend or condemn anyone, only so that when you see a swastika over the door of a Jain temple you know exactly what it is.
IXMonastics, lay followers, food and the festival year
The Jain community consists of four groups: monks, nuns, laymen and laywomen. The two renunciant groups keep the five vows in full, called the great vows. The two householder groups keep the same five vows in a lesser form, called the lesser vows, plus seven supplementary vows. The two sides depend on each other: lay people provide food and clothing for monastics, and monastics teach the religion to lay people.
Harming no living being, by body, speech or mind.
Speaking the truth, and not speaking a truth that causes harm.
Taking nothing that is not given.
Monastics keep complete celibacy, lay people remain faithful within marriage. This is the vow Mahavira added to the four vows of Parshvanatha.
Monastics give up all possessions, lay people set a limit on their own wealth.
Monastic life
Jain monastics have no fixed dwelling. They walk barefoot from place to place, use no vehicles and stay in one place no more than a few days, except during the four months of the rainy season, called chaturmas, when the roads teem with tiny creatures that are easily trodden on, so they stop in one town and teach the lay people there. At initiation and periodically afterwards, monastics pull out their hair by hand, called keshlonch, to train themselves to bear pain and to avoid depending on a barber. Monastics do not cook. They accept only food that lay people have already cooked for their own families, a little from each house so that no one has to cook specially for them.
Each tradition has its own implements for keeping non-harm. Digambara monks carry a peacock-feather whisk called a pichhi, made from naturally shed feathers, to brush gently the spot where they are about to sit. They eat only one meal a day, standing, receiving the food in their two cupped palms. Svetambara monastics carry a soft woollen broom called a rajoharana to sweep the path gently, and use a piece of cloth called a muhpatti to cover the mouth when speaking, so that breath and speech do not harm tiny creatures in the air. Sthanakvasi and Terapanthi monastics wear that cloth all day.
Lay life
An observant Jain layperson's day usually opens with the Namokar recitation, followed by a visit to the temple for viewing, called darshan. Image-worshipping Svetambara perform the eightfold offering of water, sandalwood, flowers, incense, a lamp, rice, sweets and fruit, each tied to a meaning on the path of shedding karma. Many sit in samayika, forty-eight minutes of stilling the mind while holding themselves free of attachment and aversion, and perform pratikramana, a rite of repentance reviewing the faults committed against all beings during the day.
Food
No meat, fish or eggs. Milk has traditionally been allowed. Some young people in the diaspora have moved to a fully plant-based diet on grounds of non-harm.
The strictly observant do not eat potatoes, onions, garlic, carrots or radishes, because pulling up a root kills the whole plant, and the teaching holds that roots and tubers contain countless very tiny living beings.
Taking honey harms the bees, while alcohol both arises from fermentation, which teems with countless microorganisms, and clouds the mind.
The strictly observant do not eat after dark, because insects can fall into food unseen. Some also do not drink water after sunset.
Drinking water is strained through cloth and in many homes boiled, so as not to swallow tiny creatures and to reduce the number of creatures that die in water left standing.
Fasting is the main practice for shedding karma, from skipping a single meal or a whole day up to eight days or a month, always under a teacher's guidance and with the community rejoicing in it.
Major festivals of the year
| Festival | Timing | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| Paryushana and Das Lakshana | The month of Bhadrapada in the Indian calendar, usually falling in August or September | The greatest festival season of the year. The Svetambara keep eight days, called Paryushana. The Digambara keep ten days, called Das Lakshana, each day devoted to one virtue. People fast, listen to sermons and read the Kalpa Sutra. |
| Samvatsari | The last day of Paryushana | The day of communal repentance. Jains say to one another the Prakrit phrase मिच्छामि दुक्कडं, transliterated micchami dukkadam, may all the wrongs I have done to you be rendered void. |
| Mahavir Jayanti | The thirteenth day of the waxing moon in the month of Chaitra, usually in March or April | Mahavira's birthday. Processions, sermons and charitable works. |
| Diwali | The new-moon night of the month of Kartika, usually in October or November | For Jains, the night of Mahavira's nirvana. The following day begins the new year of the Vira Nirvana Samvat era. |
| Akshaya Tritiya | The third day of the waxing moon in the month of Vaishakha, usually in April or May | Commemorates Rishabhanatha breaking a year-long fast with sugarcane juice. Those who keep the practice of fasting on alternate days for a whole year complete it on this day. |
| Mahamastakabhisheka | Once every twelve years, most recently in 2018 | The anointing of the great statue at Shravanabelagola with water, milk, turmeric and flowers, poured from scaffolding built around it. |
Sallekhana
Jain scriptures, including the Tattvartha Sutra, speak of sallekhana सल्लेखना, the vow of a person who knows that death is near because of old age or incurable illness to reduce food and drink gradually in full awareness, under a teacher's guidance and with the family's consent. The teaching draws a sharp distinction between this and self-destruction: it may be undertaken only when death can no longer be avoided, and must be carried out in a state free of anger, fear and desire. It is a rare practice that has prompted much discussion inside and outside the community, and this page records only what the scriptures say.
XJain temples and pilgrimage mountains
Jain temples go by different names in different regions: Gujaratis call them derasar, and in Karnataka a Digambara temple is called a basadi. At the heart of a temple are images of one or more Tirthankaras, told apart by the emblem carved beneath the pedestal rather than by their faces, because the tradition holds that all Tirthankaras attained the same state. A temple is not a place for petitions but a place to stand before a model of one who is liberated. Many temples forbid bringing leather goods inside, and worshippers wash and leave their shoes at the gate.
| Place | Region, now in | Tradition | Why it matters |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sammed Shikharji | Jharkhand state | Both traditions | According to tradition, twenty of the twenty-four Tirthankaras, Parshvanatha among them, attained nirvana on this range of hills. The most sacred pilgrimage site. |
| Pavapuri | Bihar state | Both traditions | Where Mahavira attained nirvana. Home to the white marble Jal Mandir temple in the middle of a lotus pond. |
| Shatrunjaya, Palitana | Gujarat state | Svetambara | A hill covered with temples, hundreds of them, counted differently by different sources. Pilgrims climb from early morning and must come down before dark, because by custom the mountain is the dwelling of the gods and no one sleeps there. |
| Girnar | Gujarat state | Both traditions | The mountain where Neminatha attained nirvana. It has both Jain and Hindu temples. |
| Shravanabelagola | Karnataka state | Digambara | The monolithic Bahubali statue about 17 metres high, erected around 981 to 983, and the place where tradition says Bhadrabahu and Chandragupta Maurya spent their last days. |
| Dilwara, Mount Abu | Rajasthan state | Svetambara | A cluster of white marble temples from the 11th to 13th centuries, famous for the carving of their domed ceilings. |
| Ranakpur | Rajasthan state | Svetambara | A 15th-century four-faced temple dedicated to Rishabhanatha, said to have 1,444 carved pillars, no two alike. |
What stands out in the table above is mountains. Many of the most sacred Jain sites are hilltops, because these are the places the Tirthankaras and many monastics chose for their final fast and meditation before liberation. Such places are called siddhakshetra, ground where someone became a siddha. Pilgrims climb on foot, up thousands of stone steps, and the climb itself is regarded as part of the practice.
XIJainism and Buddhism: same time, same region, different paths
These two religions are siblings of the same generation: both born in the Shramana movement, both from around Magadha, both rejecting the authority of the Vedas, and both with a founder from the noble warrior class who left home at thirty or close to it. Vietnamese readers, already familiar with Buddhism, easily read Jainism as a copy of it, and that is the mistake. The table below sets the two side by side. For a full account of Buddhism, see the library's own page on it.
| Point | Jainism | Buddhism |
|---|---|---|
| Founding figure | Mahavira, the twenty-fourth in the line of Tirthankaras, who restored an older religion | Shakyamuni Buddha, who found the path himself |
| Soul | There is an eternal soul, one for each living being | Non-self, no eternal self |
| Karma | Subtle particles of matter clinging to the soul | Intentional action and the momentum it leaves behind |
| Asceticism | The main practice for wearing away old karma | Regarded as an extreme to be avoided, in favour of the middle way |
| Scope of life | Earth, water, fire, air and plants all have souls | Not extended to earth, water, fire and air |
| Liberation | The soul rises to the top of the universe and remains at Siddhashila | Nirvana, the extinguishing of greed, hatred and delusion, not a place |
| Spread | Almost entirely in India, plus migrant communities | Spread across Asia and then to the world |
The Pali scriptures mention Nigantha Nataputta many times, as in the Samaññaphala Sutta of the Digha Nikaya, where he is named as one of the six famous teachers of the day, and the Upali Sutta of the Majjhima Nikaya tells of one of his lay followers turning to follow the Buddha. The Samagama Sutta reports the news of his death at Pava and the division among his disciples afterwards. On the Jain side, the scriptures mention the Buddha less often. The Buddhist passages record Jain doctrine through an outsider's eyes and in a polemical spirit, so they are read as evidence of this religion's presence, not as an accurate presentation of its teaching.
A frequently raised question: why did Buddhism nearly vanish from India after the 12th century while Jainism has survived to this day? Researchers offer several explanations, none regarded as complete. Jainism binds monastics and lay people very closely, and the laity have their own vows and daily rites, so the religion was not concentrated in a few great monasteries. The Jain community is a class of well-off merchants, able to support temples and monastics on their own over many generations. And Jainism did not spread beyond India, so all its energy went into preserving itself where it already stood.
XIINumber of adherents today
Jainism is a small religion in numbers. According to the 2011 Census of India, the country had 4,451,753 Jains, or 0.37 percent of the population, a smaller share than the 0.41 percent of 2001 even though the number rose from 4,225,053. At the time of writing, 2011 is still the most recent Indian census to have published figures by religion. Pew Research Center did not list Jainism separately in its June 2025 report but grouped it among other religions, together with Sikhism, the Bahá'í Faith, Shinto, Taoism and many small religions.
| Place | Figure | Source and date |
|---|---|---|
| All of India | 4,451,753 people, 0.37 percent of the population | Census of India 2011 |
| Maharashtra | About 1.40 million, 1.25 percent of the state population | Census of India 2011, as analysed by CPS India |
| Rajasthan | About 622,000, 0.91 percent | As above |
| Gujarat | About 580,000, 0.96 percent | As above |
| Madhya Pradesh | About 567,000, 0.78 percent | As above |
| Karnataka | About 440,000, 0.72 percent | Census of India 2011, via the Wikipedia article Jainism in India |
| Outside India | About 250,000 people | World Religion Database, cited by Pew Research Center, as of 2010 |
| England and Wales | 24,991 people | 2021 Census of England and Wales |
Pew Research Center notes that some Jains consider the Indian census figure considerably lower than the reality. One reason often given is that some Jains declare themselves Hindu, because the two communities live side by side, intermarry and attend each other's festivals.
The United States and many other countries do not ask about religion in their census, so the number of Jains there is only an estimate by community associations or sample surveys.
All figures count people who identify as Jain. The level of observance among them varies enormously, from those who fast for a whole month to those who visit the temple only during Paryushana.
There are three points where sources disagree, and this page states them plainly. First, the all-India figure for 2011 is given by Wikipedia as 4,451,753, while the CPS India analysis has 4,452,753, a difference of exactly one thousand, most likely a copying error, and this page follows the first figure. Second, the Wikipedia article Jainism in India gives Rajasthan 1,023,587 people, while CPS India gives about 622,000, and only the latter matches the rate of 0.91 percent of the state population, so this page uses the latter. Third, for Jains outside India, the 2012 Pew report cites the World Religion Database as fewer than 250,000, while the 2015 Pew report, citing the same source, gives about 250,000.
XIIIIn Vietnam
To say it plainly: Jainism has no organisation in Vietnam. It is not among the sixteen religions recognised by the State, according to the list VietnamNet published in July 2025 based on figures from Ban Tôn giáo Chính phủ (the Government Committee for Religious Affairs). There is no Jain temple, no resident monastic and no official count of followers. This page found no reliable source recording a Jain association active in Vietnam.
Historically, the studies of Champa and of the trade routes between India and Southeast Asia that the library consulted clearly record traces of Hinduism and Buddhism, but no firm trace of Jainism on Vietnamese soil. This fits a general feature of the religion: before modern times Jainism almost never spread beyond the Indian subcontinent, because its monastics were not allowed to travel by boat or vehicle, and Jain merchants who traded far afield did not bring monastic communities with them.
Where Vietnamese people meet this religion
The texts of the Chinese Buddhist canon used in Vietnamese temples call Jains Ni Kiền Tử, and call the unclothed monks lõa hình ngoại đạo, naked ascetics of another path. Many Vietnamese who chant the scriptures have read these names without knowing they refer to a religion still alive today.
Among the Indians who do business or travel in Vietnam there are Jains, but they practise their religion within the family and have not established any public place of worship.
Some Indian restaurants in the big cities and some travel guides for Indian visitors mention Jain-style dishes, meaning vegetarian food without onion, garlic or root vegetables. This is the most visible trace of the religion in Vietnamese life today.
Do not confuse Jainism with the Brahmanism of the Ahiér Cham, which is a recognised religion in Vietnam and belongs to a localised Shaiva tradition. Nor should it be confused with the other Indian religions that have temples in Hồ Chí Minh City, such as the Mariamman temple (đền Bà Mariamman), which is a Hindu temple. The library's own page on Hinduism records those places in detail.
XIVTraces in daily life and the eye of feng shui
A word before this section begins. Jainism does not teach feng shui, and this page does not attribute feng shui to it. Jainism has its own rules for siting temples, orienting images and arranging space, partly shared with the Indian art of Vastu and partly its own. This section presents those rules first. The final part is the library's reading through the eye of traditional Vietnamese feng shui, written so that readers familiar with the Vietnamese way of reading land have a point of comparison, and it is not what Jains have in mind when they build a temple.
A Jain merchant's book on building
Jainism has its own architectural treatises. A representative one is the Vatthusara, or Vastusara, composed in 1315 by Thakkura Pheru, a Jain merchant and jeweller, in Prakrit mixed with Apabhramsa, close to the everyday speech of the time so that masons and merchants could read it. The book sets out rules for building houses and temples, carving images and choosing the time to begin work. In other words, Jains have a tradition of choosing directions and dates, but that tradition comes from the Indian Vastu system, not from the compass and the eight trigrams of Chinese feng shui.
The four-faced temple
Many large Jain temples are built in the chaumukha style, meaning four-faced: images face out in four directions and the temple opens on all four sides, as at Ranakpur. The root of this style is the image of the samavasarana, the assembly hall the gods build for a Tirthankara to preach in, where, according to the teaching, beings seated in any direction see the Tirthankara facing them. This is quite unlike Vietnamese thinking, which chooses one main orientation and one main door for every building of worship. A four-faced Jain temple has no main orientation in that sense.
Sacred mountains are the mountains of the liberated
As the section on temples noted, many of the most sacred Jain sites stand on hilltops. The reason lies not in the lie of the land but in what happened there: a hill is sacred because someone fasted, meditated and attained liberation on it. For Jains, a hill becomes sacred through a life of practice, not through dragon veins or qi.
Read through the traditional Vietnamese eye
This part is the library's own interpretation. Looking at a few Jain sacred sites with the eye of a Vietnamese person used to reading land, several things suggest parallels. Shravanabelagola lies between the two hills of Vindhyagiri and Chandragiri, with a pond between them, and the place name means the white pond of the monk. A Vietnamese observer would call this a formation of two mountains embracing a bright hall (minh đường) where water gathers. The Jal Mandir at Pavapuri is a white temple standing in the middle of a lotus pond, linked to the shore by a long causeway, recalling Vietnamese water pavilions (thủy đình) and the pagodas built in the middle of ponds.
Another meeting point lies in colour. Jainism favours white: the robes of Svetambara monastics are white, the marble at Dilwara and Pavapuri is white, and white is the highest of the six leshyas. The traditional Five Phases theory assigns white to Metal, associated with drawing in and settling down, and it is also the colour of traditional Vietnamese mourning dress. The library's Main Hall gave the Jain shrine pure white together with the green of life preserved. That is the library's choice, not a rule of the religion.
From this arise two opposite misunderstandings. The first is to apply birth-palace (cung mệnh) and Eight Mansions (bát trạch) calculations to Jain temples, or to treat the Jain swastika as a feng shui talisman to hang up for guarding a house. Both apply the wrong system: the swastika in Jainism is a statement of doctrine about the path out of rebirth, not a protective object. The second is to assume that because the religion does not teach feng shui, its temples are built at random. That is also wrong: Jain temples are built according to the strict rules of Vastu and of the religion itself, only those rules speak a different language.
XVCommon misunderstandings
A small, distant religion with a few unfamiliar practices is bound to be much misunderstood. Below are gathered the most common mistakes in how Vietnamese people talk about Jainism, not to defend it, only so that you can see it accurately.
No. The two religions share a time and a region and are both shramana religions, but they differ at the root: Jainism affirms an eternal soul and regards karma as matter, while Buddhism teaches non-self and regards karma as intentional action. The Buddhist scriptures themselves record Nigantha Nataputta as the teacher of another religion.
Outsiders often say this for brevity. According to the tradition, Mahavira was the twenty-fourth Tirthankara, restoring a religion that already existed. History also has grounds for showing that a community following Parshvanatha existed before him.
Jainism has no creator god. The universe is without beginning or end. The Tirthankaras are revered as people who attained liberation, not as gods who created or govern the world.
No. The Jain swastika is set upright, accompanied by three dots and a crescent, carries the meaning of good fortune and the path to liberation, and predates the Nazi emblem by thousands of years. The Nazi emblem is tilted at forty-five degrees and black, inside a white disc on a red field.
Only male Digambara monks keep that practice, and it is the final step of the vow of non-possession. Digambara nuns and all Svetambara monastics wear white.
The muhpatti cloth is first of all meant to keep breath and speech from harming tiny creatures in the air, and to remind the practitioner to guard their speech. It existed long before anyone knew about germs.
It is much stricter. Besides no meat, fish or eggs, the strictly observant also eat no roots such as onion, garlic or potato, no honey, and nothing after sunset.
Jain ahimsa covers speech and thought as well, and both causing others to harm and approving of harm, and it extends even to beings with only one sense.
The vast majority of Jains are lay people who work, trade and raise families. Full asceticism is the path of the few who have renounced the world, while lay people keep the vows at a lighter level and fast periodically.
?Quick Questions
What is Jainism?
Jainism, Kỳ Na Giáo in Vietnamese, is a religion of India whose central axis is non-harm, ahimsa in Sanskrit. It teaches that every living being, even a grain of earth, a drop of water or a plant, has a soul, and that the soul is bound to the cycle of birth and death by karma, a subtle kind of matter that clings whenever one is moved by anger, pride, deceit or greed. The path to liberation is right perception, right knowledge and right conduct. The most recent teacher is Mahavira, a contemporary of the Buddha. Jainism has no creator god.
How many followers does Jainism have?
According to the 2011 Census of India, India had 4,451,753 Jains, 0.37 percent of the population, most numerous in Maharashtra, Rajasthan, Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh and Karnataka. The World Religion Database, cited by Pew Research Center, estimated about 250,000 Jains living outside India as of 2010, many of them in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom and Kenya. The 2021 census of England and Wales recorded 24,991 people. Some Jains believe the Indian census undercounts them.
How do Jainism and Buddhism differ?
The two religions arose in the Magadha region at the same time and both rejected the authority of the Vedas, so they are often confused. They differ at the root: Jainism affirms that each living being has an eternal soul, Buddhism teaches non-self. Jainism regards karma as particles of matter clinging to the soul, Buddhism regards karma as intentional action. Jainism treats asceticism as the main practice for wearing away karma, Buddhism chooses the middle way, avoiding both indulgence and self-mortification. Buddhism spread across Asia, while Jainism remains almost entirely in India.
Is the Jain swastika connected with Nazi Germany?
No. The swastika, svastika in Sanskrit, meaning good fortune is present, has existed in South Asia since the Indus civilisation, thousands of years before the Nazi Party. In Jainism its four arms are the four destinies of rebirth, with three dots above for the three jewels and a crescent for the place of liberation. The Jain swastika is set upright. The emblem of the Nazi Party, called the Hakenkreuz in German, is tilted at forty-five degrees and black, inside a white disc on a red field, different in shape, colour and meaning alike.
Why do Jain monks go without clothes?
Only male monks of the Digambara tradition go without clothes. For them, clothing is a possession that must be washed and stored and that causes harm to tiny creatures, so giving it up is the final step of the vow of non-possession, called aparigraha. This tradition believes that one who still keeps clothing has not fully let go and cannot yet attain liberation. Digambara nuns wear white, and all monastics of the Svetambara tradition, men and women alike, wear unstitched white garments.
What do Jains eat, and why no onion or garlic?
Jains are vegetarian: no meat, fish or eggs, no honey and no alcohol, though milk is traditionally allowed. The strictly observant do not eat roots such as onion, garlic, potato or carrot, because pulling up a root kills the whole plant, and the teaching holds that roots contain countless very tiny living beings. Many do not eat after sunset to avoid accidentally swallowing insects, and they filter water before drinking. All of this flows from the vow of non-harm.
Is there Jainism in Vietnam?
There is no organisation. Jainism is not among the sixteen religions recognised in Vietnam, and it has no temple, no resident monastic and no official count of followers. Vietnamese people meet this religion mainly in Chinese-language Buddhist scriptures, where Jains are called Ni Kiền Tử, and through Indians who do business or travel in Vietnam and practise their religion within the family. Jainism is also unrelated to the Brahmanism of the Cham.