Treasury of Jain Tales

SR No.: 006762
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: V M Kulkarni
Publisher: Shardaben Chimanbhai Educational Research Centre
Publication Year: 1994
Total Pages: 468
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 17 MB

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of Gunabhadra has many important divergencies with Pau macariya it is regarded as forming another independent version.
The Jains have their own version of the Mahābhārata (and the Harivamsa) as well. The earliest version that has come down to us is the Harivamsa-Purana in 66 saraas by Jinasena (783 A.D.). In this Purana not only are the stories of Krsna and Balarāma told in a Jain setting, but Gautama, the pupil of Mahavira, is made the narrator of the story, and in many places sermons on the Jain doctrine are inserted. The legend of Rsabha, the first Tirthankara, is told by way of introduction, and, connected with the story of krsna, the story of Aristanemi, Krsna's cousin, is presented. The story of the Kauravas and the Pandavas and the descendants of Balarăma and Krsna is also told. The Kauravas (and Karna) are converted to Jainism. Finally, the Pāndavas also become ascetics and like Aristanemi, attain to liberation.
In early Jain works Pāndavas are not given the prominence and importance which is accorded to them in the Mahābhārata; nor Krsna is deified as in the Mahābhārata; he is presented as a brave and noble ksatriya hero only. The Ardhamägadhi Canon of the Svetămbaras gives some information about Krsna and his clan and the Pandavas. The Vasudevahindi (not later than A.D. 609) which deals with the wandering and adventures of Vasudeva, the father of Krsna, gives us only at the beginning a few facts of the story of Harivamsa.
In a sense, the earliest complete account of the whole of Harivaisa is to be found in the Cauppannamahāpurisacariya of Silanka also known as Śilācārya. The work was composed in A.D. 968. It deals with all the great men ('mahāpurisa'), later known as salakä-purusas' and is a precursor of the later and more famous Trisasti-salāka-purusa-carita of the great Hemacandra (A.D. 10881172). Si lanka relates the story of Aristanemi, Krsna Väsudeva; Baladeva (or Balarāma) (and the Pāndavas), i.e., the Harivassa of the Jains which is a kind of their counterpart to both the