Jain Cosmology

by Collette Caillat and Ravi Kumar

The cosmos has been for the Jains, from the very earliest times, a gigantic theatre where souls paly out their roles. They travel across the ocean of samsara, stuggling from the rebirth to another, until the times comes, when they are liberated, and finally win the spiritual perfection of the Siddhas.The Jians make no distintion between this vision of the transcedental world and the experience of life. Whatever is fated for the souls occcur in aworld which has been made known to us by astronomical, geographical and other observations, and which thinkers of every Indian community from the very earliest times have tried to interpret. About the Author :Colette Caliiat held a chair at the University of Paris and has also been the guiding spirit of the Centre for Buddhist and Jain Studies. She has Worked upon the canonical texts and languages of Buddhism and Jainism, but is also interested in the custom and beliefs that are described in the books of the Jain Community.Ravi Kumar :All the Illustrations in this volume are taken directly from manuscripts of classical Jain cosmological texts collected by Ravi Kumar.