Jainism: India's Lesser-Known Religion

Although Jainism has only about six million adherents and until recently was relatively unknown outside of India, it currently has successful growing immigrant communities in North America, Western Europe, the Far East, Australia, and elsewhere.  Prescribing a path of non-violence towards all living beings, Jainism is said to have been a great influence on Mohandas Gandhi.  Sharing ideas found in Hinduism, the idea of samsara, the wheel of birth, death and rebirth, is the locus of the gradual process whereby the self learns to remove itself from bondage to the material world until nothing remains except the purity of the jiva, the individual’s soul.  Read more . . .