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"THUS SPAKE MAHĀVĪRA"
A. S. Gopani
The sixth century B.C. is one of the most outstanding periods in the history of the whole world. It was marked by mental stir and spiritual urge everywhere. Socrates in Greece, Zoroaster in Persia, and Confucius in China sparked a revolution in the thoughts of their countries. Mahāvīra and Buddha did the same thing in their lands of birth. The whole nation in the country was undergoing fundamental transformation. Arbitrary distinctions of caste were openly condemned by Mahāvīra and Buddha who asserted that full scope should be given to all human beings to achieve peace and progress. Admission of women into their Sanghas followed as a corollary of this basic principle. People were fed up with the excessive devotion to the ritual as it deprived the religion of the element of real ethical values. Mahāvira and Buddha vigorously voiced their protest against priestly oligarchy which exploited the people for its own ends in the name of chaotic and disturbing ritualism. Such a state of things in all the fields of human activities provided to Mahāvīra an additional reason to spell out his message of deliverance with force and frankness. It was in the background of these circumstances that Mahāvīra, the last and twentyfourth Tirthankara, who came on the scene, fought with vision and vigour more than what Pārsva, his predecessor, two hundred fifty years before, had displayed.
Jainism is as old as Time. It sometimes, receded in the background while at other times it occupied the vanguard. This depended on the situations and circumstances developing at particular times. The Tirthankaras came and went according to the inexorable law of Karman, of course, leaving the world better.
In the Jaina system the Cārvāka view that perception alone is the valid source of knowledge has no place. It takes percep
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