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The Jaina Agama Bhagavati (10) contains a similar account about a tapasa monk Tamali who had courted a fast unto death and who was approached by the gods with a request to be their Indra; but Tamali thought that it was unwholesome and unprofitable to bargain with his penances and made no reply to the request made by the gods.
Jivaka Kumāra Bhrtya was the place physician to King Bimbisara. He was well-known to royal families and sresthi families even in far-off lands. He had exceptional skill in many surgical cases. In appointing him as his palace physician, King Bimbisara also assigned to him the duty of attending the Buddha and the monks of his order. Jivaka was the son of a well-known public woman of Rajagṛha named Salavati (11). As he was abandoned at his birth on a heap of rubbish, he was brought up later in the palace of (minister) Abhayakumara. He had his education at Taxila. Anguttara Nikaya Aṭṭhakatha, Vinaya Pitaka and many other Buddhist texts contain interesting accounts of the remarkable skill of this surgeon which he applied even on the person of the Buddha and many other distinguished people of that age.
In the Buddhist tradition, Jivaka Kumāra Bhṛtya was a very distinguished person of his time. It was he who had introduced Ajatasatru to the Buddha. The Jaina Agamas or Purāņas take no, note of him.
Ananda and Sulasa have, however, been taken to be the representative-most lay followers of the Jaina tradition, as Anathapindika and Visakha (mother of Mrgara) have been taken to be the representative-most lay followers of the Buddhist tradition. A brief account of each follows:
Ananda
Jitas'atru was the ruling monarch at Vanijyagrāma. To the north-eastern direction of the city, there was a garden named Dyutipalasa. In the same garden, there was a caitya which was dedicated to a spirit of the same name (i. e., Dyutipalasa). In fact, the garden took its name from him. Householder Ananda lived in the same city. The name of his wife was Sivananda. She was a very beautiful,
