History of Jaina Monachism

SR No.: 001727
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: S B Deo
Publisher: Deccan College Research Institute
Publication Year: 1956
Total Pages: 616
Language: English
Classification: Book_English, Principle, & History
File Size: 12 MB

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S. B. DEO
wine in such cases even by wearing other types of garments if it be necessary for that! (yadi svalingena na präpyate udḍāho vā bhavati tato lingabhedadikamapi kartavyam),200
As against these exceptions, cases of refusing to take advantage of such concessions were not wanting. The Avasyakacurns describes the story of one Jinadatta who refused to eat flesh even though prescribed to him by a physician. The Vyavaharabhäṣya depicts the tale of some five hundred Jaina monks who met death by fasting and let their bodies exposed to the jackals and vultures when they could not get food owing to a famine in
Kosala.
Way of Eating Food:
The rules about eating food were the same. The monk was not to consume food with attachment either for its taste or for its quality. No sound of teeth or of mouth was to be done while eating.206
The Jinakalpikas and the Sthavirakalpikas:
The following were some of the differences regarding food between the monks of these two modes of discipline:
(1) The Jinakalpikas ate food in the same 'porisi' in which it was obtained, while the Sthavirakalpikas were allowed to preserve it upto the fourth 'porisi."207
(2) The Jinakalpikas were not to go beyond the chief garden (agrodyänāt parataḥ) for obtaining food, while the Sthavirakalpikas were allowed to go to a distance of half a yojana for this purpose,208
(3) The Jinakalpikas never accepted food from a lady right from the day she had conception, while the Sthavirakalpikas could do so till she was very much advanced in pregnancy.
(4) The Sthavirakalpikas did not accept food from a lady whose child was being nourished on breast-feeding. The Jinakalpikas, however, did not do so till the child was old enough to be independent,209
(5) The Jinakalpikas had to beg and obtain food in the peculiar way they had decided to follow. The Sthavirakalpikas, however, begged food which was secured with the normal rules of 'pindeṣaṇā."
203. Brh. kalp. bha. Vol. IV, 3413.
204. II, p. 202.
205. 10, 557-60.
206. Ogha-N. bhā, 289.
207. Brh. kalp. bhā. Vol. V, 5264-74.
208. Ibid. 5290.
209. Ogha-N. Comm. 165ab.