Das Lakshan Dharma

Ten days, ten qualities

Das Lakshan is the largest observance in the Digambar year. For ten days in the month of Bhadrapada, usually falling in August or September, one quality of the soul is taken up each day, discussed in the mandir, and held in mind through the day's fasting and worship.

The list comes from the Tattvarth Sutra, where the ten are given as the constituents of dharma itself. They are described as lakshanas, characteristics, and this choice of word is precise: they are not ten rules imposed on the soul but ten features of what a soul is like once the karma covering it has thinned.

The ten, in order

Uttam kshamaउत्तम क्षमा

Forgiveness. Not the suppression of anger but its absence, so that provocation finds nothing in you to catch on.

Uttam mardavउत्तम मार्दव

Humility, the opposite of pride. Jain texts list eight things people are proud of, among them birth, learning, wealth and beauty, and treat each as an obstacle rather than an asset.

Uttam arjavउत्तम आर्जव

Straightforwardness. Thought, speech and action agreeing with one another, with no gap for deceit to live in.

Uttam shauchउत्तम शौच

Purity, understood specifically as freedom from greed. The Jain reading is that greed is what actually makes a mind unclean, so contentment is the cleansing.

Uttam satyaउत्तम सत्य

Truth. Speech that is accurate, and also beneficial and gentle; a truth spoken to wound is not counted as satya in Jain ethics.

Uttam sanyamउत्तम संयम

Restraint, of two kinds together: care not to harm any living being, and control of the five senses and the mind.

Uttam tapउत्तम तप

Austerity. Six outer forms, chiefly fasting and reduced intake, and six inner ones, among them confession, service, study and meditation. The inner six are held to matter more.

Uttam tyagउत्तम त्याग

Renunciation, in the form of giving. Four gifts are named: food, medicine, learning and protection from fear.

Uttam akinchanyaउत्तम आकिंचन्य

Non-attachment, taken further than tyag: not merely giving things away but ceasing to regard anything as mine, the body included.

Uttam brahmacharyaउत्तम ब्रह्मचर्य

Celibacy, and beyond it the literal sense of the word: dwelling in the self. Complete for ascetics, and fidelity with restraint for householders.

Why every one of them says uttam

Forgiveness offered because it looks well, or truth spoken because lying would be found out, is ordinary virtue and belongs to the world. Uttam marks the same quality practised for no reason outside itself, by a soul that has stopped calculating what the practice will return.

This is why the ten are treated as characteristics of the soul rather than as duties. The practice is not adding a quality that was absent; it is removing what was covering one that was there all along.

Kshamavani, the day after

The festival opens with forgiveness and closes with it. On the day following the tenth, Jains approach everyone they may have injured in thought, word or deed over the year, ask to be forgiven, and forgive in return without condition. Family, neighbours, colleagues and people barely known are all included.