Lord Mahavira Vol 03

SR No.: 023278
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: S C Rampuria
Publisher: Jain Vishva Bharati Institute
Publication Year: 2001
Total Pages: 232
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 20 MB

Page 52

Fifth Vow of Vardhamâna Mahâvira: Its Causes
43
centuries B.C. when Yaska flourished, people might have begun to deride the primitive Samana institution which might have forced him to play intellectualism with grammar. 'Samana' is a proper noun, not an epithit of signifying 'Communal Festival' where all partaking members of the community were of one mind. Young and old women rushed forth to Samana with joy and felicity to find lovers and to enjoy with their old lovers.8
This state of sexual-relationship is very correctly reflected in the two epithits signifying this state of affairs. This relationship is summed up in the words Jara' and Jaya10. Jara means a male human being who is the lover of any woman in the society. This word does not carry the sinister meaning of a voluptuous unsocial element in this age. The sinister meaning was later on attached to this word. Jaya was not used in the sense of Patni or married wife. Any woman of society who bore children from her lover the Jara was called Jaya. This clearly establishes that men and women, without any distinction, could make merriment with each other with mutual consent without social disapproval or blasphemy. Love bears throughout the stamp of an undisguised natural sensuality.
11
Women in this communal context, were known as Yosas () More beautiful damsels amongst them were known as Usas. Usa in Rigveda is depicted as brilliant and attractive maiden dressed in variegated colours, ever joyful dancing with her breasts open, effulent in pearless beauty, radiant with her lover, charming and resplendant.12 They did not belong to the Hetaera class of society as suggested by Pischel and Geldner13 but that was the general state of the social organisation. What came to be looked down in later times on the division of society into the Noble and the Hated was approbated and revered in the undivided state of society. Urvasis were best among Usas. They could not bind themselves to any one particular man. They belonged to the whole society or Gana. Urvasi, the Ganike was the mother of the illustrious Sage Vasistha1 but his fatherhood is ambiguous and doubtful. Urvasis were also used to ensnare the effective enemy leaders as in the case of Non-Aryan Pururava. Sex-relationship of the Vedic people, in their earliest stage, was of the type of unrestrained and free communal sex enjoyment.
14