This brief introduction to Jainism and Sikhism is designed to help readers understand these important religious traditions. With both nuance and balance, this text provides broad coverage of various forms of Jainism and Sikhism with an arresting layout with rich colors. It offers both historical overviews and modern perspectives on Jain and Sikh beliefs and practices. The user-friendly content is enhanced by charts of religious festivals, historic timelines, updated maps, and a useful glossary. It is ideal for courses on Jainism, Sikhism, and South Asian religions and will be a useful, concise reference for all readers eager to know more about these important religious tradition and their place in our contemporary world.

Jainism is arguably the most non-violent and austere religion in the world. While lay Jains attempt to never harm humans or animals, the strict non-violence followed by the highly revered monks and nuns also proscribes harm to any living being, even a microscopic organism. And while laywomen (and a few laymen) undergo long and difficult fasts, the longest being for one month, renouncers' austerities also include pulling their hair out by the roots two to five times a year, walking bare-foot throughout India most of the year, and, in the case of some monks, not wearing any clothing at all. Jainism: A Guide for the Perplexed is a clear and thorough account of this fascinating tradition, explaining many basic Jain values, beliefs and practices in the same way they are taught to Jains themselves, through the medium of sacred narratives. Drawing from Jainism's copious and influential narrative tradition, the author explores the inner-logic of how renouncers' and laypeople's values and practices depend on an intricate Jain worldview.

Itinerant white-robed ascetics represent the highest ethical ideal among the Jains of rural Rajasthan. They renounce family, belongings, and desires in order to lead lives of complete non-violence. In their communities, Jain ascetics play key roles as teachers and exemplars of the truth; they are embodiments of the "lokottar" - the realm of the transcendent.

Based on thirteen months of fieldwork in the town of Ladnun, Rajasthan, India, among a community of Terapanthi Svetambar Jains, this book explores the many facets of what constitutes a moral life within the Terapanthi ascetic community, and examines the central role ascetics play in upholding the Jain moral order. Focussing on the Terapanthi moral universe from the perspective of female renouncers, Vallely considers how Terapanthi Jain women create their own ascetic subjectivities, and how they construct and understand themselves as symbols of renunciation. The first in-depth ethnographic study of this important and influential Jain tradition, this work makes a significant contribution to Jain studies, comparative religion, Indian studies, and the anthropology of South Asian religion.

This book is the first comprehensive study of Jainism to be published in the West. It is written by a practicing Jain, drawing on his rich experience of Jainism in all its aspects. It is to be published in two volumes.

Volume 1 covers the antiquity of Jainism; its history, popular support and spread in India; Jain migration abroad; schisms within Jainist ranks; the teachings of Mahavira, detailing the path of purification, austerities and meditation; spiritual development within the Jain philosophy; Jain community, the Jain rituals and animal welfare, environmental concerns and vegetarianism. Volume 2 introduces Sacred Literature, Jain philosophy and the system of Jain logic within a theory of knowledge, including omniscience and the concept of soul; and Jainist theories of Physics, Chemistry, Biology and Medical Science, Astronomy and Mathematics. It includes sections on Art and Architecture, temples and places of pilgrimage.

Both volumes are written in a very accessible style: "Let me introduce you to Jainism by greeting you in a Jain way, Jai Jinendra. The greeting has a special meaning. It means honour to the person who has conquered himself. It also means honour to the conqueror of inner evils, who has shown the path of self-conquest and happiness to all living beings ... Life is dear to us all, to happy individuals but also to the unhappy. But questions arise in our mind. Who has given us such life? Who takes it away when we die? Why are there injustices in life? . . . Since the beginning of time humans have sought answers to these questions and have attempted to unravel the great mysteries of creation and the cosmos through religious and metaphysical speculation . .. In Indiamany different solutions have been put forward ... Among them is Jainism, one of the oldest religions in the world".

The last ten years have seen interest in Jainism increasing, with this previously little-known Indian religion assuming a significant place in religious studies.

Studies in Jaina History and Culture breaks new ground by investigating the doctrinal differences and debates amongst the Jains rather than presenting Jainism as a seamless whole whose doctrinal core has remained virtually unchanged throughout its long history. The focus of the book is the discourse concerning orthodoxy and heresy in the Jaina tradition, the question of omniscience and Jaina logic, role models for women and female identity, Jaina schools and sects, religious property, law and ethics. The internal diversity of the Jaina tradition and Jain techniques of living with diversity are explored from an interdisciplinary point of view by fifteen leading scholars in Jaina studies. The contributors focus on the principal social units of the tradition: the schools, movements, sects and orders, rather than Jain religious culture in abstract.

Peter Flugel provides a representative snapshot of the current state of Jaina studies that will interest students and academics involved in the study of religion or South Asian cultures.