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FASTING UNTO DEATH ACCORDING TO THE JAINA TRADITION
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Bāravai (Dvāravati). 42 He is married to lovely Somā, the daughter of the brahmins Somila and Somasiri. But, having heard Arithanemi's preaching, he is converted, and renounces worldly life. In fact, he is already possessed of the highest spiritual knowledge and vigour. Therefore, he is immediately allowed to meditate in a lonely, terrifying cemetery. Somila, meanwhile, had gone 'eastward from the city of Bāravai for fuel, and gathered faggots, darbha-grass, kuśa-spikes, and leafy twigs'. 43 He returns, and passing by the solitary graveyard, he sees Gayasukumāla, and 'he recalled his spite and fell into a rage ... He took some moist clay ... stuck it like an earthen bowl on Gayasukumāla's head, from a pyre took in a pot flaming coals of khadira-wood, like blooming kimśuka flowers, and cast them upon ... Gayasukumāla's head. Then in fear ..., he departed speedily ....43 Gayasukumāla, who is deep in meditation, bears this ‘fiery, abounding, violent, furious, vehement, grievous, bitter, and intolerable pain ... in a blessed spirit, with fine resolution ... and in him arose boundless, supreme, ... absolute knowledge and vision; and thereupon he became ... free from all sorrows'.44 The gods celebrate this great spiritual victory.
Is this tragic chapter a comparatively recent development? Some details, particularly the suddenness of Gayasukumāla's spiritual attainments, are obviously late.45
4 Antagada 1163–1172. English trsl., Barnett, loc. cit., 63–77.
48 Barnett's translation, loc. cit. p. 74 (Barnett writes: Gaya-sukumāle, nom.; but see E. Leumann, JRAS, 1907, 1079–1080), with minor changes.
44 veyaņā pāubbhūyā ujjalā, 'there arose a fiery ...', Antagada 1169, 28. Cf. Barnett, loc. cit., p. 75, n. 1, referring, for the commentary's gloss, and discussion on the meaning of ujjala (skr. ujjvala-), to Hoernle, ad Uvas $ 111 (II, p. 79, n. 209). - In the present context, probably in both literal and figurative senses.
This trial appears to be both a test of the progress already accomplished, and a means to further accomplishment (cf. Uvās). Its importance is obvious in the text (perhaps somewhat blurred in Barnett's translation): tae ņam tassa Gayasukumalassa anagārassa tam ujjalam jāva ahiyāsemănassa subheņam pariņāmenam passatth'ajjhavasāņeņam, tayavaranijjāņam kammānam khaeņam kamma-rayavikirana-karam apuvvakaranam aruppavithassa añante aruttare jāva kevala-varanāna-damsane samuppaņņe; tao pacchā siddhe jāva ppahine, 'as he bore this fiery ... pain with an auspiciously developing spirit, with blessed application,-then, because the hindering kammas were annihilated, as he had entered the apuvvakaraņa stage which scatters the murk of kamma-in him arose ..., 1170, 1-4.
46 Compare the developments in Chinese Buddhism, Gernet, loc. cit.-For Hinduism, see H. von Stietencron, loc. cit. p. 16-17.
