20Dharmic
Jainism
No creator god. The universe is eternal and runs by its own order.
Architecture
Eternal loka, jīva, no creator
No creator. Eternal loka. Jīva bound by karma moves through births, including god-births, until liberation.
- 01
Uncreated loka
The universe is not made and not destroyed.
- 02
Heavens, middle, hells
One cosmos. Meru sits in traditional middle-world maps.
- 03
Jīvas, including gods
Gods are souls in a high birth. They are not authors of the world.
- 04
Embodied jīva
The human slot is a soul under karma.
- 05
Liberation
Rebirth stops. The two great canons do not match book for book.
- Time
- Ascending and descending eras. No final destruction.
- Agents
- Jīvas. The Jinas are teachers, not creators.
- Human slot
- A soul that can exhaust karma. The aim is release, not a better rebirth as the goal.
- Break
- Karma. There is no devil to blame and no creator to appeal to as maker.
Recorded claims
An evidence label is shown only where the kind of source is already established. No label means unclassified. A label is not a judgment. Source Needed means no source is attached yet. It does not mean the claim is false, weak, or disproven.
Origin / Reality
No creator god. The universe is eternal and runs by its own order.
Source NeededHuman Nature
An embodied jīva, bound by karma.
Source NeededDeath / Afterlife
The jīva continues according to karma, or is liberated.
Source NeededRebirth
Yes, until liberation.
Source NeededOther Beings
Innumerable jīvas, including gods and hell-beings. They are not creators.
Source NeededOther Realms
A vertically ordered loka: heavens, the middle world, and hells.
Source NeededWorld Structure / Axis
Traditional cosmology includes a Mount Meru in the middle world. It is not the Hindu or Buddhist Meru.
Source NeededDestruction / Reset
The universe is not destroyed. Time moves in ascending and descending eras.
Source NeededHow Truth Is Known
The Jinas’ teaching, scripture, and conduct. Digambara and Śvetāmbara canons differ.
Source Needed
Sources & EvidenceShowHideNo source is attached yet. Source Needed is a research gap, not a judgment.
The tradition or source
What that source says. Not a scholar’s retelling, and not a SCARCE inference.
None attached.
A modern researcher
What a scholar or other modern writer says about the source. Not the source’s own words.
None attached.
SCARCE
What this project infers or sets beside the records. Not what the source said.
None attached.
How we know
Where the evidence comes from, and how far it is from the people it describes. The labels are not a score. They do not rank traditions. A manuscript year, a tradition’s own claim, and a date from the ground are kept apart on the timeline.
The Śvetāmbara canon is traditionally said to have been written at a council in Valabhī in the 5th century CE. That date is traditional. The oldest surviving Āgama manuscripts are medieval. Digambara tradition holds that the ancient canon was lost.
Mahāvīra’s lifetime is not fixed by a contemporary inscription of his teaching. The preaching may be older than every manuscript by many centuries. The two communities do not agree on what survived. A modern outline of “Jainism” that ignores that split overfills the record.
Original evidence → transmission / copy → translation / documentation → modern interpretation
01
Original evidence
Recorded oral tradition
Both traditions describe an oral canon before any writing. No page from Mahāvīra’s time is extant.
02
Transmission / copy
Later religious or traditional text
Śvetāmbara Āgamas and Digambara texts such as the Ṣaṭkhaṇḍāgama are later traditional corpora. They are not one library.
03
Translation / documentation
Modern scholarly reconstruction
Printed editions and translations rest on late manuscripts and on each community’s own reading.
04
Modern interpretation
Modern scholarly reconstruction
A single history of Jainism is a scholarly construction across a split the traditions themselves mark. This chart’s cells name the split instead of closing it.
The twenty-one questions
Asked of every system. Gaps are recorded as gaps. Nothing here is filled in to make a pattern prettier.
01
Where are we?
In the middle region of an eternal, uncreated loka, with heavens above and hells below.
Read every system on this question02
What is reality made of?
Souls and non-soul. Matter, karmic bondage, and the rest of the categories are taught; Digambara and Śvetāmbara analyses are not identical.
Read every system on this question03
What is a human being?
A jīva in a body, obscured by karma, capable of liberation.
Read every system on this question04
What is consciousness?
The jīva is conscious. Karma limits what it knows. Omniscience is claimed of the liberated and of the Jinas, not of ordinary people.
Read every system on this question05
Where did humanity come from?
Not created. Humans are jīvas in a human birth within a beginningless universe.
Read every system on this question06
What happens at death?
The jīva goes to another birth, or to liberation if karma is exhausted. Funeral rite is not what saves.
Read every system on this question07
Does consciousness return to embodiment?
Yes, until the jīva is freed.
Read every system on this question08
Where is consciousness between lives?
The jīva transits to the next birth or to the summit of the loka if liberated. A narrative underworld between lives is not the center.
Read every system on this question09
Are there nonhuman intelligent beings?
Yes. Gods and hell-beings are jīvas in those births. They did not create the world.
Read every system on this question10
Can those beings become human or appear human?
A god is a soul in a divine birth and can later be born human. Tīrthaṅkaras are human. That is karma, not a visit from a creator.
Read every system on this question11
Are there multiple realms or worlds?
Yes. Heavens, the middle world, and hells are parts of one loka, not separate creations.
Read every system on this question12
Is there a central mountain, tree, pillar, axis, heart, or sacred center?
Traditional cosmology places Mount Meru at the middle world. It is a Jain cosmological object, not a claim that Jainism is Hinduism.
Read every system on this question13
Is the world itself alive?
The loka contains innumerable living souls. The universe as one animal is not the Jain claim.
Read every system on this question14
Has civilization or the world been destroyed or reset before?
No. The universe does not end. Eras decline and recover.
Read every system on this question15
Does history operate linearly or cyclically?
Cyclic eras in a universe that does not begin or end.
Read every system on this question16
Is there an opposing positive/negative force?
No devil opposite a creator. The opponent that matters is karma binding the jīva.
Read every system on this question17
What is humanity supposed to become?
A liberated jīva, a siddha, free of karma. Digambara and Śvetāmbara accounts of the path differ in practice.
Read every system on this question18
Is reincarnation a destination, punishment, school, growth process, or something else?
Bondage. Rebirth is the result of karma and ends at liberation. It is not a gift.
Read every system on this question19
What lies beyond the visible world?
The rest of the loka: heavenly and hellish regions, and beings one does not see. It is still the same universe.
Read every system on this question20
How does this tradition claim humans can know any of this?
The teaching of the Jinas, scripture, and a disciplined life. The two main canons do not contain the same books.
Read every system on this question21
Does the structure or motion of the heavens correspond to events, conditions, or consciousness within the human realm?
Suns and moons are parts of the loka. Reading a birth from the stars is not how Jain teaching says karma is known.
Read every system on this question22
Why did humanity forget?
The filed lines say karma obscures the jīva and limits what it knows. They do not say humanity forgot.
Read every system on this question
Structures where this record appears
- Axis, mountain, tree, heartIs there a central mountain, tree, pillar, axis, heart, or sacred center?
- Flood, judgment, cycle, endingHas civilization or the world been destroyed or reset before?
- Return, resurrection, renewalDoes consciousness return to embodiment?
- Nonhuman intelligencesAre there nonhuman intelligent beings?
- Realms and worldsAre there multiple realms or worlds?
- Is the world itself alive?Is the world itself alive?
- Line or wheelDoes history operate linearly or cyclically?
- Do the heavens correspond?Does the structure or motion of the heavens correspond to events, conditions, or consciousness within the human realm?
- How truth is claimedHow does this tradition claim humans can know any of this?