Idea of Ahimsa and Asceticism in Ancient Indian Tradition

Author(s): Bansidhar Bhatt
Publisher: B J Institute

Page 48

REFORM RELIGIONS....
39
accepted, and fact remains a fact, whether the traditionalists or orthodox accept it or reject it. We are here concerned with facts. Schubring has traced some sources from the early corpus of the Jaina canonical texts that tell us, that right from the beginning of Jainism, monks or nuns accepted and consumed meat and fish freely in their ascetic order. It means, they were not prohibitted to do so even in early Jainism. The Āyara, the earliest canonical text of ths Svetambaras, say
bahu-y-atthiyam va mamsam maccham va bahu-kanta yam... bahu-ujjhiya-dhammie, .... na padigahejja /
(Ā yara JĀ gS 2.1.10.403, pp.139-140)
"... meat with many bones or fish with many thorns containing a greater amount to be thrown away (but only little amount remains to be eaten), should not be accepted."
The next satra 404 further instructs the monks and the nuns who in case unknowingly receive such a piece or meat of fish from someone, then instead of returning it rudely to the giver, they should go to a lonely place, such as a garden or a shelter-room, and consume it freely, but the bones or thorns should be placed separately as per instructions for that (cf. Ja gS p.140).
s prose line of the satra 403 in A yara is originally a matrical line - a disturbed śloka line - and it recurs, also in Dasaveyaliya (5.1.73) with some variants as follows,
bahu-atthiyam poggalam animisam va bahu-kantayam /
(Dasa-S. p.143 = Dasa-L. p.621)
Here, poggala stands for meat (cf. the explanation offered by Alsdorf-1. pp.8-9). The following sätras 403-404 in the Ayara are elaborated in Dasaveyaliya 5.1. vss. 73 84-85.
The Carņi on the Āyara ascribed to Jinadasa (ca. 6th or 7th cent. AD in Gujarat ?) interprets the satra 403 appropriately as it appears in the Ayara, that in accepting meat or fish, there is a deviation (vira hana) from the self - restraint (samjama), the self (aya) and the holy scripture (pavayana), but it (= deviation) is justified for the monks or nuns on the ground of illness. karaniga-gilanass' attha ...
(cf. Āyara-Cami. SS. p.344, line 3; see also Doctrine. S 154).