In Jainism, Ajiva is the unconscious or inanimate category of the universe. Ajiva or the non-spirit is one of the everlasting categories of the universe. Jaina religion holds that the whole universe can be brought under two everlasting, uncreated, co-existing but independent categories described as jiva and ajiva. That which has consciousness is jiva and that which has no consciousness but can be touched, tasted, seen and smelt is ajiva. Jiva and ajiva do not correspond to ‘I’ and not ‘I’, but it is an objective classification of things in the universe. The ajiva is the object and Jainism says that as surely as there is a subject that knows so surely, there is an object that is known.
The term ajiva is used to denote the five categories of pudgala (matter), kala (time), dharma (motion), adharma (rest) and akasha (space). Of these, dharma, adharma, akasha and kala are arupa (without form) and matter is rupa (with form). Their essential distinction from the jiva is that they as such lack life and consciousness.