Arya Bhadrabahu

Author(s): M A Dhaky
Publisher: Z_Nirgranth_Aetihasik_Lekh_Samucchay_Part_1_002105.pdf and Nirgranth_Aetihasik_Lekh_Samucchay_Part_2

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M. A. Dhaky
the Sthaviravali embodies a portion which, in point of fact, came from another and, seemingly, somewhat later source. It represents a shorter version (samkṣipta vācanā), as against the much more elaborate Phase 3 portion (vistṛta vācana), commencing as it does from Arya Yasobhadra and his two aforenoted disciples and extending further down, through six successive pontiffs, to Arya Vajra's disciple Arya Vajrasena and ending with the names of the latter pontiff's four disciples (c. 1st cent. A.D.). But, it is the aforenoted Phase 3 portion, which covers an enlarged version of the second, is very, very important, because it, for the first time, gives detailed denominations along with the succinct indications on the origination of the various ganas (cohorts), their śäkhas (branches), and their kulas (regional and clanal groups), all of these being the subdivisions formed by the specific bands of mendicants. Arguably, the starting point for these group-proliferations temporally must be located a few decades after Arya Bhadrabahu from whose senior disciple Godāsa, the earliest and hence the very first gana of the Nirgrantha monastic system is reported, as per the northern hagiological tradition, to have emanated. (This may have taken place some time in the latter half of B.C. the third century.) While the list of succession within this Phase 3 (which figures in several manuscripts of the Paryuṣaṇa-kalpa) terminates with Arya Phalgumitra (c. early 1st cent. A.D.), some mss. also contain a Phase 4 extension leading up to Arya Skandila (or Sandila)-the 17th pontiff in succession from Arya Phalgumitra-who presided over the Synod convened in Mathura in c. V. N. 830-840/A.D. 353-3637. These four successive sections of the sthaviravali are in prose and were dovetailed to form a single continuous text, largely in Ardhamâgadhi, by casting them into a homogeneous stylistic mould which doubtless reveals a few lately introduced linguistic affectations of the Mahārāṣṭrī Prakrit. The last, or Phase 5, which is the latest portion of the Sthavirāvalī, however, is in versified form and unambiguously is rendered in Mahārāṣṭrī Prakrit. It starts from Arya Phalgumitra and, after mentioning the 16th pontiff in succession, namely Arya Dharma who was the guru of Arya Skandila, switches over to Arya Jambu (apparently the confrère of Arya Skandila of whom it takes no notice) and next gives the names of six pontiffs in succession, the sixth being Devarddhi gani who chaired the Valabhi Synod II in A.D. 503, or, according to an alternative tradition, in A.D. 5169,
Jambu-jyoti