Jain Dharma as a Virtue Ethics for Sustainability

Abstract Dharma, as a virtue ethics for sustainability, has served as a role model for Jains for several millennia. In this chapter, I share examples from key Jain texts and contexts. Jains continue to derive their inspiration from Mahavira (literally, the great hero, who was the contemporary of the Buddha) and their other great teachers whom they see as role models practicing dharma to attain moksha (i.e., liberation). In their teachings, they urge their followers to practice nonviolence and renunciation. They demonstrate that penance based on such a virtue ethics leads to moksha, the ultimate goal, according to Jain philosophy. Evidently, in Jain contexts, religion, ethics, and environmentalism are intertwined with each other instead of distinctly evolved theories. My observations of the Jains support Jain texts holding that human behavior is irrevocably interwoven with environmental conditions; the deterioration of one implies and involves the other.