Arhat Parshva and Dharnendra Nexus

SR No.: 002108
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: M A Dhaky
Publisher: L D Indology Ahmedabad
Publication Year: 1997
Total Pages: 204
Language: English, Hindi
Classification: Book_English, Articles, History, Art, E000, & E001
File Size: 8 MB

Page 127

Pārsvanātha Images in Ellorā
109
with seven-hooded snake-canopy. The largest number of figures are carved in cave 32 where occur as many as 12, three of which are in the dhyāna-mudrā. The caves 30, 31, 33 and 34 are having in order five, two, ten, and two figures.
The Pārsvanātha images from Ellorā are specially significant for elaborate rendering, in the parikara, of the upasarga or tirade of tormentations inflicted on Päráva by the evil spirit Sambara. The earliest known examples, illustrating the upasargas of Pārsvanātha are in Bādāmi (Cave IV) and Aihole (Jaina Cave), both datable to c. A.D. 600, wherein the figures of Sambara are shown attacking Pārśva with a boulder or with some weapon (Plate 54). However, the figures of Padmavati, in both instances, holds a long obliquely laid parasol and is joined by the figure of Dharanendra, both standing on the right flank of Pārsvanātha. Close to the figure of Pārśva with fivehooded snake-canopy, sits at his left the figure of Sambara bowing in humility with folded hands. The most elaborate representations of such scenes depicting the onslaught of Sambara to dissuade Pārsva from his tapas are met with at Ellorā. Barring a few examples known from the Malādevi temple at Gyāraspur (Vidisha, M.P.), Indian Museum, Calcutta (provenance probably Bihar), and Humca (Dist. Shimoga, Karnataka, two examples),' such elaborate representations are rarely encountered. In the rendering of the upasarga, at Ellorā are noticed three, four, five, six, seven or eight figural manifestations of Sambara, each one engaged in the act of causing a different type of assault to Pārsvanātha. In about 20 images, all in the kāyotsarga-mudrā, the upasarga scenes are carved, this being the highest number for such images at any site. Surprisingly, the available Pārsva images belonging to the Nirgrantha-Svetāmbara tradition do not show the upasarga episode. Instead, in the ceiling each of the Mahāvīra and the Sāntinātha temple at Kumbhāriä (c. A.D. 1062 and 1082, Banaskantha District, Gujarat), we come across the detailed renderings pertaining to the enmities of Kamatha (Meghamāli or Sambara) and of Marubhūti (Pārsvanātha in his previous existence).
The earliest literary reference to the upasarga of Pārsva is inside the Pārsvābhyudaya kāvya of Jinasena of Pancastūpānaya of the Southern Church (before a.d. 784 or more probably c. 825),10 wherein only two upasargas posed by the devil Kamatha are described; they are the apsarases or the beautiful damsels and the hurling of huge rock-boulders at Pārsva." Another work, the Uttarapurāņa of Guņabhadra (c. mid-ninth century A.D.) deals with the life of Pārsva in detail; but that pertains mainly to the enmity between Marubhūti and Kamatha or Pārśva and Sambara in their previous existences. As to the upasargas of Sambara during the course of tapas of Pārsva, it merely mentions that the devil Sambara had caused