Vipashyana Karmkshay Ka Marg - Book Summary

Here's a comprehensive summary of the Jain text "Vipashyana Karmkshay ka Marg" by Kanhailal Lodha:

The book, "Vipashyana Karmkshay ka Marg" (Vipashyana: The Path to the Eradication of Karmas), authored by Kanhailal Lodha, explores Vipashyana as a scientific process for spiritual development and the eradication of karmic bonds, leading to liberation from suffering.

What is Vipashyana?

The term "Vipashyana" is derived from the root "pashya" (to see) with the prefix "vi." In ancient times, "pashya" meant not just seeing but also sensing, experiencing, or realizing. The prefix "vi" signifies "special" or "distinct."
Therefore, Vipashyana means to see or experience something specially or in its true nature. This involves realizing things as they are, without the distortions of attachment (raga), aversion (dvesha), or delusion (moha).
It is the realization of the truth of a situation or object, its inherent nature or "dharma." In essence, Vipashyana is the direct realization of the true nature of reality.

Vipashyana: The Path to Truth and Liberation

The realization of truth in Vipashyana is not through intellectual imagination or beliefs but through direct experience and practice. As one lives and acts according to truth, the depth and subtlety of truth are increasingly realized.
The more subtle something is, the more powerful, special, capable, and inherently rich in miraculous or inconceivable powers it becomes. This principle applies to Vipashyana as well.
By practicing Vipashyana, one begins to directly experience the subtle, subtler, and subtlest truths (principles) and powers of nature. Ultimately, this leads to the manifestation of infinite knowledge, infinite perception, infinite bliss, and infinite capability within oneself.
Upon achieving this, one becomes completely free from bondage and attains liberation from the cycle of birth, death, and suffering.

Vipashyana: A Simple and Scientific Process

Vipashyana is not a secret, magic, or miracle. It is a simple and accessible path for the progressive realization of truth.
It requires no hidden secrets, additions, special materials, philosophical intellect, or linguistic knowledge. It simply involves expanding one's own inner perception and knowledge from the gross to the subtle.
It is a process of revealing one's own pure perception and knowledge by dispelling illusions and false beliefs through personal experience. Anyone, regardless of caste, creed, country, profession, age, gender, literacy, or wealth, can practice it.

Vipashyana as a Scientific Process for Spiritual Development:

The book details how Vipashyana leads to the eradication of karmas and liberation by focusing on several key aspects:

Stability of Mind (Chitta Sthirta):
- The initial step is to focus the mind on the breath. This stops the mind's wandering and stabilizes it.
- Then, the mind is directed to the sensations on the skin of the body. Due to the mind's stability and subtlety, one begins to experience the activities (sensations) occurring on the skin.
- By repeatedly observing the sensations throughout the body, from head to toe and toe to head, the mind's stability, equanimity, and subtlety increase.
Equanimity (Samata):
- By focusing on the subtle levels of the body, both external and internal, Vipashyana allows one to experience pleasant and unpleasant sensations.
- If the mind develops attachment to pleasant sensations or aversion to unpleasant ones, experiencing joy or sorrow, it loses its stability and subtlety, becoming agitated and gross.
- Vipashyana involves experiencing these pleasant and unpleasant sensations without developing attachment or aversion, simply observing them. This deepens equanimity and strengthens self-control, leading to restraint of mind, speech, and body.
Eradication of Perceptual Veil (Darshanavarana-Kshaya):
- As the mind's equanimity, stability, and subtlety increase through Vipashyana, the power of experience also grows. This weakens the perceptual veil (Darshanavarana).
- Perception evolves from gross to subtle, subtler, and subtlest. Normally, we are unaware of the continuous subtle activities happening within our body and on our skin due to the veil over our perception.
- Through the restraint and control of the mind in Vipashyana, this veil is reduced. Initially, one perceives sensations on the outer level of the body.
- As equanimity and restraint increase, the perceptual veil further diminishes, allowing one to experience sensations arising from muscles, blood, and bones. Eventually, one can even perceive chemical processes and electromagnetic waves within the body.
- This process continues to the subtlest levels. As equanimity and restraint deepen, the perceptual veil is shed, revealing the mind's subtle waves, the karmas that bind them, and even the accumulated karmas and imprints from past lives in the subconscious mind.
- When equanimity and restraint reach their peak, all perceptual veils are removed, and with the absence of attachment and aversion, perception becomes pure and omniscient.
Eradication of Knowledge Veil (Jnanavarana-Kshaya):
- Knowledge exists in various forms, such as sensory knowledge (sound, smell, taste, touch) and intellectual knowledge. However, this knowledge is often limited to the gross, external aspects of things, failing to grasp their subtle, internal reality. This is considered impure or false knowledge.
- As Vipashyana weakens perceptual veils and increases equanimity, the power of experience grows, leading to the true and beneficial understanding of the subtle, internal nature of reality. This is called right knowledge (Samyak Jnan).
- Through Vipashyana, one directly observes not only the external world but also the constant change (origination and cessation) happening every moment within one's skin, blood, muscles, and bones. This change occurs even more rapidly in the subtle realm, in the mind, and in the subconscious mind, possibly billions of times in a moment.
Understanding Impermanence (Anityata):
- The direct realization of impermanence in the world is a key outcome of Vipashyana as veils are shed.
- Holding onto the self, identifying with, or seeking protection from this impermanent world is ignorance. One begins to see impermanence in relationships, life, and possessions.
- This leads to the detachment from mutable things like body, mind, wealth, and loved ones, fostering a sense of "non-self" (anatmabhava).
Understanding Suffering (Dukkha):
- Through experience, one realizes that what is considered pleasure or happiness in the world is also ultimately suffering. This is because such pleasure arises from attachment (raga), which creates mental storms that disturb equanimity.
- The mind, driven by attachment to sensory pleasures, becomes restless and agitated. In this state, one begins to see the suffering inherent in pleasure, realizing the futility of seeking happiness in an impermanent and unsatisfactory world.
Understanding Cause and Effect (Karma Niyam):
- Vipashyana reveals that every event in the world occurs according to the inevitable law of cause and effect. No event is unexpected or accidental.
- Everything happening is a result of one's own past actions (karmas). Therefore, there is no room for complaint, grief, joy, or sorrow. Blaming or reacting with attachment or aversion to events is ignorance.
Developing Wisdom (Prajna):
- Progress in subtle perception through Vipashyana increases wisdom, leading to a deeper understanding of the subtle principles and laws of the world.
- One gains clear knowledge of karma formation, influx, bondage, fruition, recollection of past lives, birth and death, restraint, and liberation.
- As understanding of subtle principles grows, limited and distorted knowledge becomes pure and clear. Eventually, when all veils on knowledge are removed, infinite knowledge is fully manifested.
Eradication of Delusion Veil (Mohaniya-Kshaya):
- As equanimity and subtle experience increase through Vipashyana, one directly perceives the waves of attachment, aversion, and delusion.
- One also sees how these emotions create new karmic imprints (granthi), which eventually bear fruit, leading to the formation of body and mind, birth and death, and pleasant and unpleasant sensations.
- Reacting to these sensations with attachment or aversion creates new imprints, perpetuating the cycle.
- One realizes that any mental wave, whether of attachment or aversion, leads to the loss of peace, happiness, freedom, and contentment, and the rise of suffering.
- Where previously one found pleasure in vices like attachment, aversion, delusion, and violence, now one experiences suffering.
- The conclusion is that the only way to break the cycle of suffering is to prevent the formation of new karmic imprints and to break down and shed the old ones.
Preventing New Karmic Imprints:
- New karmic imprints are formed by reacting with attachment or aversion while experiencing the results of past karmas.
- To prevent this, one must remain in equanimity (as a witness) when experiencing pleasant or unpleasant sensations arising from past karmas, without attachment or aversion. This restraint (samvara) stops the formation of new karmic bonds.
Shedding Old Karmic Imprints:
- The way to destroy old karmic imprints is through their "breaking" or "cleaving."
- Detaching from body, mind, wealth, and loved ones (through equanimity) is gross karmic cleaving.
- Cleaving the sensations (imprints) manifesting on the subtle body, mind, and subconscious mind into pieces is subtle karmic cleaving.
- This cleaving leads to the intense fruition and shedding of old karmas. This process involves concentration (dhyana), self-study (swadhyaya), and self-offering (kayotsarga) at a subtle level.
- Victory over attachment, aversion, and delusion reduces their influence, increasing enthusiasm, happiness, peace, and freedom. This further fuels the effort to conquer them. Through this cycle of dharma, one gradually reaches the supreme state of equanimity, achieving complete victory over vices, becoming free from attachment, aversion, and delusion.
Eradication of Obstacle Veil (Antaraya-Kshaya):
- As attachment, aversion, and delusion diminish through Vipashyana and equanimity grows, experience progresses from gross to subtle, and inner powers and experiences manifest.
- Increased inner strength enhances effort and vigor, manifesting as enthusiasm, which helps in achieving goals.
- As inner strength grows, the perception of subtler sensations increases, expressed as equanimity and love (maitri) and joy (pramoda).
- Vipashyana cultivates detachment, reducing desires and artificial needs. This alleviates the suffering caused by unfulfilled desires, leading to contentment and satisfaction.
- It is a natural law that those who utilize what they have wisely naturally receive more beneficial things. The suffering of lack does not afflict them; their minds are filled with abundance.
- As attachment weakens, selfishness and narrow-mindedness decrease, and the spirit of service, compassion, and philanthropy grows.

Conclusion: The Four Karmas and Liberation

Vipashyana practice weakens the four main karmic obstructions: knowledge veil, perception veil, delusion veil, and obstacle veil. These are interconnected, and weakening one affects the others.
These four karmas obstruct the innate qualities of consciousness: knowledge, perception, purity, and vigor. Their eradication leads to the growth and ultimately the infinite expansion of these qualities.
In addition to these, there are four other karmas: name (nama), clan (gotra), lifespan (ayu), and feeling (vedaniya). These karmas shape the body, mind, circumstances, and sensory organs in accordance with the subtle qualities of consciousness.
The cause of these four karmas, like the other four, is attachment, aversion, delusion, and the desire for sensory pleasure.
As attachment, aversion, and delusion are removed through Vipashyana, leading to self-purification, their impact on name, clan, lifespan, and feeling karmas also diminishes.
When attachment, aversion, and delusion are completely eradicated, the bonding of karmas that create body, lifespan, and clan ceases.
Old karmas are exhausted through their ripening and shedding, leading to a state beyond karma – a state that is indescribable and experienced only through direct realization. This is called Nirvana.

In essence, Vipashyana, through the practice of restraint (samvara) and shedding of karmas (nirjara), purifies the aspirant, leading to the eradication of all karmas and the attainment of pure, enlightened, and liberated consciousness.