परिणामादो बंधो मुक्खो
By डॉ. कमलचंद सोगाणी
Summary
The text presents verses from the Jain text *Ashtapahud* by Acharya Kundakunda, along with a commentary. It describes the qualities of an ideal ascetic, emphasizing equanimity in all dualities. The ascetic is said to maintain equal-mindedness toward enemies and friends, praise and blame, gain and loss, and even toward a blade of grass and gold. Such a person is free from greed, pride, deceit, and anger, and is endowed with a pure nature. This individual attains supreme happiness. The text further explains that all virtuous (punya) and sinful (papa) outcomes arise from one's inner states or *parinama* (thought-impulses). According to the Jina's teaching, both bondage (*bandha*) and liberation (*moksha*) are determined solely by these internal thought-impulses, not by external actions alone. The commentary by Dr. Kamalchand Sogani reinforces that the core teaching is the centrality of inner mental states in determining spiritual progress.
Conclusion
The implications of this text center on the primacy of internal mental states over external circumstances in determining spiritual outcomes. It establishes that bondage and liberation arise solely from one's own "parinama" (thought-impulses or dispositions), not from external actions or objects. The document emphasizes that a true ascetic maintains equanimity across all dualities—friend and foe, praise and blame, gain and loss, straw and gold—and that freedom from greed, pride, deceit, and anger leads to supreme bliss. The key outcome is a reorientation of spiritual practice: the path to liberation is not about renouncing the world but about purifying one's inner nature. This shifts responsibility entirely onto the individual's mental state, making self-awareness and emotional regulation the core of spiritual discipline. The text thus provides a framework for understanding how subjective experience, rather than objective conditions, governs the cycle of bondage and release.