Religion and Culture of the Jains

SR No.: 014007
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: D C Sirkar
Publisher: University of Calcutta
Publication Year: 1973
Total Pages: 168
Language: English
Classification: Seminar & Articles
File Size: 10 MB

Page 130

A. K. CHATTERJEE
115
60 years. The evidence of the Tiloyapaņņatti and Harivaṁsa regarding Pușyamitra is confirmed by Merutunga.5 9
We have already mentioned the fact that, in the colophon of the Harivamsa, Jinasena has given the names of a few important contemporary rulers of India. He has also mentioned the name of king Nanna, who built the temple of Pārsvanātha at Vardhamāna (66. 53). This Nanna should be identified with Mahārāja Nanna (written Nanna) who is described in the Mankani inscriptione o as Kațaccuri-kulaveśma-pradipa and is usually assigned to the second half of the 6th century A. D. The inscription discloses the names of Nanna's queeen and son as Daddā and Taralasvāmin. Although Tarala svāmin is represented in that inscription as a Saiva, his father Nanna, if Jinasena II is to be believed, was a devout Jain.
Our author ridicules the caste consious Brāhmaṇas and poses the following question-01
pāpa-päkena daurgatyaṁ saugatyam punya. pākataḥ|
jīvānāṁ jāyate tatra jāti-garveņa kiṁ vrthāl/
In several stories he tries to show the superiority of the Jain ascetics over their Brāhmaṇical counterparts. 2 He represents Kicaka&8 as embracing Jain religion after his defeat by Bhima. Even Väsudeva Krşņa is depicted as a devotee of the Jain Tirthankara Neminātha.64 This is exactly what Ravişeņa says in the Padma Purāņa where all the principal characters of the Rāmāyaṇa are represented as Jain devotees. Jinasena's devastating criticism of Vindhyavāsinis must be noted in this connexion. “Can a goddess who needs so many
59 See Ind. Ant., 1914, pp. 118f.; see also Raychaudhuri, PHAI, p. 391, note 1. [But the 90 years' rule ascribed to the three Sunga kings seems to be a fabrication of no value. -Ed.].
60 See The Classical Age, p. 197. 61 43.121.
62 See specially the story of the chastisement of the Brāhmaṇa Somadeva and his two sons by the Jain guru Nandivardhana (43. 99ff.).
63 56.37ff. 64 62.57.
65 See Ch. 49 ; in this chapter, Jinasena tells a novel story regarding the origin of Vindhyavāsini.