Jain cosmology

The shape of the universe

The Jain universe, the loka, is finite and has a definite form, conventionally likened to a standing human figure with hands on hips. It is uncreated and indestructible, and there is no god who made or governs it. Around it lies the aloka, empty space in which nothing can move, since the medium of motion does not extend there.

The lower region contains seven hells, descending in severity. The middle region is a thin disc containing the inhabited continents, at whose centre is Jambudvipa with Mount Meru at its axis. Above are the heavens, in many tiers, and at the very summit is the siddhashila, where liberated souls come to rest.

Time

Time runs in cycles without beginning. Each cycle has a descending half, avasarpini, in which lifespan, stature, happiness and religion steadily decline, and an ascending half, utsarpini, in which they recover. The present age is a late and degenerate phase of a descending half, which is why the tradition holds that liberation cannot now be attained here and that the transmission of Mahavira's teaching has decayed.

Twenty-four tirthankaras appear in each half-cycle. This gives the tradition an unbounded past and future without a creation or an end, and makes its own historical figures instances of a repeating pattern rather than unique events.

Gods and rebirth

Jainism has gods but no God. The heavens are populated by beings of great power and long life who are nonetheless still bound, still subject to karma, and still destined to be reborn. A god cannot attain liberation from the heavens; only a human birth permits it. This inverts the usual religious ordering and is the ground for the tradition's insistence that the tirthankaras, being liberated, are beyond petition.

Diagrams

The cosmology was represented in painted diagrams, the lokapurusha, showing the universe as a figure with the regions marked. Produced in quantity from the medieval period, chiefly in Gujarat and Rajasthan, they are among the most recognisable objects of Jain art and functioned as teaching instruments as well as devotional images.