WORLD RELIGIONS

Detailed explanation-1: -Mahavira taught that people can save their souls from the contamination of matter by living a life of extreme asceticism and by practicing nonviolence toward all living creatures. This advocacy of nonviolence encouraged his followers, monastic and lay, to become strong advocates of vegetarianism.

Detailed explanation-2: -The prominent severe ascetic practices included fasting, celibacy, sleep-avoidance, wilderness seclusion and selfimposed poverty. Highly uncommon and generally disapproved of were austeries which harmed and weakened the body with no purpose of ultimately strengthening it.

Detailed explanation-3: -Jewish asceticism focused overwhelmingly on abstention from food. Early Christians largely rejected abstention from impure foods, but otherwise drew heavily on Jewish fasting practices and their meanings. Christians placed new emphasis on sexual abstention and renunciation, to which they gave new meaning.