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________________ JAINISM IN NORTH INDIA Magadha under the leadership of Saisunaga, who, according to the Puranas, destroyed the prestige and influence of the descendants of Pradyota," I though the Jaina sources tell us that Avanti now and then suffered defeat at the hands of Udayin. Here arises the difficulty as to who was the real successor of Udayin. But we need not at all enter, for the present, into any discussions about these controversial and still unsettled facts of Indian history. For our purpose suffice it to reiterate the fact that the contest between Magadha and Avanti was finally decided in favour of the former under the leadership of some Saisunaga, who is known to us either as Sisunaga or Nandivardhana, or whose full name may be, as Dr Pradhan suggests, Nandivardhana-Sisunaga* Thus having seen the growth of the Magadhan Empire under the Sansunagas we shall see in brief how far the Jaina church was connected with them. It may be stated here that whatever has been said up till now and whatever is going to be said from now about the different langs and dynasties that are claimed by the Jainas as their own or as those of their sympathusers has been claimed by the Buddhists also. There are reasons and reasons for this phenomenon of Indian history, but we need not enter at all into these details, because thereby it is not possible to fix a criterion in accordance with which we can say that such and such a king was a Buddhist or a Jaina by faith. Unless there are some inscriptional records or other sound historical documents it is not possible to put down anything as an historical fact. Nothing can be predicted as gospel truth where the source of information rests only with the canonical books and with some legendary and literary traditions of the people. Taking first Bimbisara or the Srenika of the Jainas it must be said that, whatever may be the claims of the Buddhists about him, looking to the nature of the evidence put forward by the Jainas it is certain that he was a great devotee of Mahavira. So much has been written about him and his successors by the Jainas that It is not possible to do anything but enumerate a few of the facts connected with their careers with a view to illustrate their relations with the Jaina church The Uttaradhyayana tells us that King 1 Pradhan, op al, P 217' C Raychaudhuri, op cit, p 782 fit TET : TEST: C SGT --Avasvaka-Sutra, P 090 * CT Pradhan, op at, pp 217, 220 Raychaudhur, op al , pp 188-184 . Cf Pradhan, op al, p 220, Raychaudhuri, op al, PP 182-183 116
| SR No. | 011067 |
| Book Title | Jainism in North India |
| Original Sutra Author | N/A |
| Author | Chimanlal J Shah |
| Publisher | Longmans Green and Compny London |
| Publication Year | 1932 |
| Total Pages | 66 |
| Language | English |
| Classification | Book_English |
| File Size | 3 MB |