Asian Perspectives on Animal Ethics

Rethinking the Nonhuman

Neil Dalal, Chloë Taylor, Neil Dalal, Chloë Taylor

• Publisher: Taylor & Francis
• Year: 2014
• eBook ISBN: 9781317749943
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Biological Sciences
• Subtopic: Ethnic Studies
• Index: Biological Sciences

To date, philosophical discussions of animal ethics and Critical Animal Studies have been dominated by Western perspectives and Western thinkers. This book makes a novel contribution to animal ethics in showing the range and richness of ideas offered to these fields by diverse Asian traditions.

Asian Perspectives on Animal Ethics is the first of its kind to include the intersection of Asian and European traditions with respect to human and nonhuman relations. Presenting a series of studies focusing on specific Asian traditions, as well as studies that put those traditions in dialogue with Western thinkers, this book looks at Asian philosophical doctrines concerning compassion and nonviolence as these apply to nonhuman animals, as well as the moral rights and status of nonhuman animals in Asian traditions. Using Asian perspectives to explore ontological, ethical and political questions, contributors analyze humanism and post-humanism in Asian and comparative traditions and offer insight into the special ethical relations between humans and other particular species of animals.

This book will be of interest to students and scholars of Asian religion and philosophy, as well as to those interested in animal ethics and Critical Animal Studies.

1 Being sentiently with others

The shared existential trajectory among humans and nonhumans in Jainism

Anne Vallely

Introduction

Jainism is renowned for its exquisitely intricate ethical code that extends far beyond the human, and its complex catalogue of beings, some so small as to be invisible to the human eye, but who are nonetheless important players in the drama of life and liberation. The animal—or more accurately, the nonhuman—plays a role of immeasurable importance in Jainism, a degree which is astonishing in comparison with most other traditions. For this reason, among those with an interest in the “animal question,” or, more generally, in the relationship between religion and ecology, Jainism has been garnering considerable attention as a possible source of traditional wisdom about the place of humanity within the broader biotic community. But Jainism differs in striking ways from most of the traditions that are explored for this end. While Jainism offers a fascinating articulation of the human-nonhuman dynamic in which all life is treated as inviolable, it considers human beings as distinct from and superior to all other life forms. In addition, it does not seek engagement or communion with other beings but, instead, it ultimately seeks distance from them. Jainism parts company with mainstream environmental thought in its refusal to see human potential as realizable only in fellowship with the rest of nature. Instead it envisions human fulfillment as possible only in isolation from the world.

By treating the human as ontologically distinct and privileged, Jainism can be said to violate the new “post-human” ethos, which problematizes the very demarcation between human and animal. Jacques Derrida, for instance, in his book The Animal That Therefore I Am, argues that the labeling of living beings as “animal” is a form of violence and tantamount to “a crime.”¹ Jainism unapologetically does just that.

The word “animal” has become problematic for many in the contemporary period because, among other things, it glosses over the great diversity of life in the service of differentiating that which stands ostensibly outside it: the human. It is often used in such a way as to point unquestionably to a condition from which humanity is categorically exempt and, it is argued, thereby permits us to think about and act toward real, live animals in ways that would be unethical if directed toward humans. It is now commonly argued, on many fronts—from evolutionary biology to moral philosophy—that the human/animal demarcation has no ontological basis and should be discarded and superseded by a less anthropocentric classification.² Jainism, however, would never make this claim. Jains unhesitatingly demarcate between the human and the animal, and place human beings in a category of their own, superior to animals. Indeed, the animal is subsumed within the broader nonhuman category that also comprises insects and plants. Whatever the merits and demerits of this categorization, it is important to note that it does not, in and of itself, encode an exploitative relationship. The animal in Jainism, though ontologically distinct, is on the same existential trajectory as the human, and its claims to life are no less valid than those of any other sentient being.³

Despite the existential gulf Jainism posits between humans and nonhumans, it recognizes the world in its entirety as alive, purposeful, intelligent, sensory, and responsive. It is this crucial recognition—perhaps more importantly than the distinctive ideological and ethical elaborations emerging from it—that has secured Jainism’s robust and harmonious human-nonhuman encounter for the past three millennia. The Jain example—among many others—should give us pause about making broad indictments about terminology, no matter how laudable the motives. More vital and more fundamental for the creation of a harmonious “community of subjects” than terminological correctness,⁴ or “getting it right” conceptually, ideologically, or even ethically,⁵ is the embodied, sensory experience of being in the presence of others, and with others.

Most scholarly attention, my own included, has focused on the renunciatory dimensions of Jainism: its philosophical texts, ethical system, distinctive religious practices etc., all of which aim to limit involvement in worldly existence. These undoubtedly make Jainism unique among the world’s religions, but by confining our discussion to ideology and to conceptually informed practices relating to Jain renunciation, we run the risk of leaving its phenomenological meaningfulness unexplored. And yet the primary impetus for Jainism’s celebrated focus on nonviolence and its astonishing attention to the nonhuman is not ideological (or, therefore, ethical), but relational, insofar as it inheres in the far more fundamental experience of being sentiently with others. This chapter argues that embodied perceptions of the animate cosmos constitute the generative ground from which Jain philosophical and ethical reflections emerge. This Jain “way of being” might fruitfully be characterized as one of sympathy—not in the sense of being tenderhearted—but in the sense of the word that accentuates its receptive and responsive connotations: being Jain means being receptive, or alert, to the omnipresence of the activities of life, in order to be effectively responsive to the universal requirement of all beings. In brief, the Jain way of being with animals, and with the nonhuman more generally, is where the Jain imagination begins.

Background

Appearing on the historical scene sometime between the ninth and sixth centuries BCE, Jainism was part of a śramaṇa (“world-renouncing”) movement that also gave rise to Buddhism. The śramaṇa movement arose at a time of social and economic upheaval in India, with the development of cities, commerce, and increased trade. It was also the time of the emergence of the sciences of logic, physics, the establishment of rules for empirical observation, and the systematization of the Indian philosophical tradition. These developments reflect the emergence of new conceptions of the self and of the material, incarnate world. The early śramaṇa groups, in particular, emphasized the opposing natures of self and cosmos. The self came to be seen as estranged in the world, in a suffering state of karmic bondage and yearning for spiritual release (mokṣa). The śramaṇa movement rejected the Brahmanical orthodoxy of the day and considered the Brahmins’ preoccupation with cosmic and social order to be fundamentally flawed. All the elements that went into maintaining that order—the hierarchical caste system, the elaborate liturgy, the rituals, and above all the cult of animal sacrifice—were anathema to the renouncers.

Jainism is the oldest of humanity’s still extant world-renouncing traditions. Its scriptures capture, in a distilled form, a sense of radical alienation from the world. Of course, the Jain community of today is far more than simply a “renunciatory tradition,” and certainly within the social world of South Asia, it is better known for its impressive this-worldly successes, than its asceticism. Nevertheless, renouncers continue to be held in very high esteem, and the renunciatory ethos of traditional Jainism continues to inform virtually all aspects of the tradition.

The most basic teaching of Jainism states that life, in all its myriad expressions (human, animal, insect, plant, water, earth, air, fire beings, hell and heaven beings etc.), is endowed with an eternal quality that is noble and worthy of respect. each eternal quality, called jīva, is a perfect entity, endowed with omniscience and the capacity for bliss. But each is equally estranged in the world, and in a state of suffering. The most fundamental existential quandary shared by all beings of the cosmos is the entanglement of the soul and matter (i.e., of jīva and ajīva). That soul (jīva) and matter (ajīva) are utterly enmeshed is what prevents the soul from achieving a state of bliss, a bliss which can only be experienced in a state of purity and separation from all that is matter. Jains do not posit an original state of separation from which there was a “fall,” instead they assert that the jīva-ajīva entangled state is eternal, “without beginning.”⁶

Jainism depicts the jīva as blundering on a lonely sojourn through endless time within a purposeless, violent cosmos. It is a cosmos indifferent to its machinations; no hand of God extends to assist the fortunate few. Instead, the jīva moves continuously, one life after another, in and out of birth categories, inhabiting diverse sensory expressions. And it alone, on its own efforts, must meticulously extricate itself out of the worldly mess. This would be a hopeless, desperate situation if it were not for the teachings of the Jinas (Spiritual Victors)⁷—those perfected human beings who attained enlightenment by their own might, and then taught others the way to escape the cycle of birth and death (saṃsāra). Within a fixed and vast cycle of time, a series of twenty-four such Jinas appear to reveal the timeless truth about the nature of the soul and the path to salvation. Their teachings, through memorialization, application in everyday life, ritualization, and celebration, constitute the foundation of the tradition of Jainism.

Being sentiently

Jains assert that the teachings of the Jina are perfect; beyond courage and self-determination, they have provided us with all we need to attain salvation. But what is to come of those who do not or cannot hear the teachings of the Jina? Jainism postulates the existence of some 8.4 million species of life, most of which lack the capacity to receive the Jina’s message; they are literally blind and deaf to it.

All living beings are born in one of four states of existence, or “birth categories,” called gatis. The four gatis are humans (manuṣya), celestial beings (deva), hell beings (nāraki), and the composite category of animals, plants, insects, and microorganisms (grouped together as tiryañca). The human gati is accorded such overwhelming prominence because it is from this state alone that final liberation (mokṣa) can be attained. even the celestial beings look down from their heavenly abodes in envy at the uniquely human capacity for self-transcendence. Despite its privileged position, the Jina does not preach to those of the human gati alone. More fundamental than birth category for hearing and comprehending the teachings of the Jina is the degree to which one participates sensorially in the world. Those who are endowed with five senses are privileged in this way, and they are present in all four gatis; the rest, ignorant of the Jina’s teachings, live unaware of their existential plight.

Jainism postulates that each being occupies a fixed place in a cosmological hierarchy based on degrees of sensory perception and self-awareness. Worldly beings inhabit space and time and come to perceive their existence in saṃsāra through their senses. By contrast, those beings who have attained enlightenment no longer exist sensorially. Instead, they experience unobstructed perception and inimitable bliss through the soul itself, which is its nature. This experience of plenitude, unmediated as it is by sensorial differentiation, marks the successful completion of the existential trajectory directing all life and, as such, it is the goal of the renouncers, the enlightened humans who have given themselves over to the disciplines that enable them to transcend their sensory modes of existence. They alone can remain detached and dispassionate, observing the world without emotionally participating in it. The canonical Daśavaikālika Sūtra states, “Knowing that pleasing sound, beauty, fragrance, pleasant taste and soothing touch are transitory transformations of matter, the renouncer should not be enamored of them.”⁸ But the rest of us—that...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Table of Contents
• List of illustrations
• Notes on contributors
• Acknowledgments
• Introduction
• 1 Being sentiently with others: the shared existential trajectory among humans and nonhumans in Jainism
• 2 Animal compassion: what the Jātakas teach Levinas about giving “the bread from one’s own mouth”
• 3 China’s Confucian horses: the place of nonhuman animals in a Confucian world order
• 4 Heidegger and Zhuangzi on the nonhuman: towards a transcultural critique of (post)humanism
• 5 The argument for Ahiṃsā in the Anuśāsanaparvan of the Mahābhārata
• 6 Cutting the cat in one: Zen Master Dōgen on the moral status of nonhuman animals
• 7 Nonhuman animals and the question of rights from an Asian perspective
• 8 Bovine dharma: nonhuman animals and the Swadhyaya Parivar
• 9 Snakes in the dark age: human action, karmic retribution, and the possibilities for Hindu animal ethics
• Index