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TİRTHAMKARAS OF THE FUTURE
Nalini Balbir
I wish to express my deep gratitude and respect to Pandit Dalsukh D. Malvania. Useful discussions on the subject of Future Tirthamkaras have been provided to me by his undeservedly little known study of the Thāņamga and Samavāyāmga Ahmedabad, 1955; in Gujarati). Moreover, in September 1981, in Ahmedabad, I had the good fortune to read with him the relevant portion of the palm-leaf manuscript of Bhadreávara's Kahāvali which he had himself thoroughly analysed in a paper read at the first International Symposium on Jaina Canonical and narrative Literature (Strasbourg, France, 16-19 June 1981). I am happy to be able to include here some material from this text. 1. Data about Future Tirthamkaras : 1.1. Statements about the existence of Future Tirthamkaras; list
material. 1.1.1. Canonical sources. 1.1.2. Later Svetāmbara lists, 1.1.3. Collation of the Svetämbara data.
1.1.4, About the Digambara lists. 1.2. Narrative sources.
1.2.1. Narrative sources concerning, F. Ts' careers. 2. Ethical aspects connected with F. Ts.
2.1. Tirthamkarahood in the chain of rebirths.
2.2. Original context and later use of the Tirthamkaranāmakarman notion. 3. Notes on Buddhist counterparts.
Conclusion, 4. Synoptical chart.
A symmetrical conception of Time lies in the background of the oldest Jaina
ogical descriptions : on the one hand the sixfold descending half-cycles (Sa avasarpiņi Pk. ossappini), and on the other hand the future sixfold ascending halfcycles (Sa. utsarpini; Pk. ussappini) which endlessly "follow directly upon one another in unbroken succession" on the Wheel of Time. The "Great Men" of the former, among whom are Mahāvira and the other Tirthamkaras who came before him, are fairly well-known from numerous Jaina sources of various types, and have for a long time aroused the interest of many scholars. In contrast, the “Universal History" of the coming age appears to have been comparatively neglected in modern studies in the belief that it is a mere repetition of the avasarpiņi one.
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