Doctrine of Jainas

Author(s): Walther Shubring, Wolfgang Beurlen
Publisher: Motilal Banarasidas

Page 53

AN HISTORICAL SKETCH OF JAINISM
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JACOBII himself decided in favour of 477 or 476 basing his deductions SPAW 1930, 557 ff. on the year 477.
$20. As to Mahāvīra's success as a teacher Jinac. 134 provides us with monumental figures which we can leave as they are. The only point worth mentioning is that women are by far in the majority The nuns were headed by Ajja-Candană also referred to by Viy. 458b where it tells us of Mahāvīra introducing his mother Devānandā to her. The monk very rightly mentioned as the first was Indabhūi, better known by his Gotra name as Goyama, though sporadically we hear of a "second" and a "third” Gautama, Aggibhūi and Vāubhūia. Since, acc. to Viy. 153 a, they all appear simultaneously it is likely that Therāv. 1 by denoting all three as oldest, second and youngest monk of Mahāvīra was lead by a desire for classification. As one putting questions to his master Goyama as compared with a number of other persons is by far the most important, and as such he appears even where, as is the case in the Viy., there is no longer any real dialogue thinkable or probable, but where question and answer have come to congeal into mere forms of style. In Viy. 755a, however, Goyama appears as a living person where we are told of his having wiped the floor with an antagonist and of his being commended for his ready wit by Mahāvīra who, acc. to Viy. 646b, also informs him that they both had been friends already for a number of existences. These two passages are probably the only ones in the Canon reflecting something like the note of a personal feeling on Mahāvīra's side. For as well as always he remains impersonal, and even where he rejects contradicting-often rather foolish teachings of other preachers (annautthya), he does so by speaking in naked antithesis. It was probably in his nature to be non-committal and stern. Though it were wrong to judge Mahāvīra merely by how he appears to us in the dialogues of the Canon. He would never
1. Parıśıstaparyan p 6 corr 2nd ed (1932) p XXf
2 Comp the 3 Kassapas (Uruvelā-, Nadi- and Gaya-K) with 500, 300, and 200 followers, Mahāvagga 1, 15
3. The AUTHOR, Worte My's p 10
4 Comp the attractive confiontations by LEUMANN, Buddha un Mahāviras, p. 28 and Maitreya-samıtı p. 1-3.