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JAIN JOURNAL
sometimes the terminology used being the same or very similar, and they were opposed to Vedic sacrifices and rigid ritualism of the Brahmanas. But they upheld, unlike the Sramanas, the authority of the Vedas, tried to or pretended to derive their ideas from them, still looked up to the Brahmanas as custodians of their culture and readily accepted the varṇāśrama system imposed by them on society. There is no doubt that it was a very laudable attempt to bring together the Brahmanas and the Sramanas. We do not know whether it was a deliberate attempt with that specific object in view, or simply a result of the impact and interaction of the two currents.
In this period no Vedic sacrifices, involving slaughter of animals, are known to have been performed even by prominent kings. The common man had developed a dislike for such religious killings. Apart from these, the Vedic religion of the time had become so rigid, complex and elaborate that it lost popular appeal and gradually came to be confined to sections of Brahmanas well-versed in Vedic traditions. The masses either turned to the Sramanas or the Brahmavadi Janakas, or to the new popular cult which was gradually emerging as a synthesis of the two and was based on purity of conduct and personal devotion. The varņāśrama institution was a characteristic of this new evolution of this age.
The first exponent and pioneer of the Sramana revival of this age was obviously the Tirthankara Aristanemi or Neminatha, who was born at Sauripura (near Batesvar in Agra district of Uttar Pradesh), an important city in the ancient Surasena Janapada. His mother was Sivadevi, and father, Samudravijaya, was a leader of the Yadava Ksatriyas. Samudravijaya's younger brother was Vasudeva whose sons were the famous heroes, Krsna and Balarama. To escape constant harassment at the hands of Jarasandha, King of Magadha, the Yadavas, under the leadership of Krsna, abandoned their cities of Mathura and Sauripura, and migrated to the west coast where they founded the city of Dvaraka and settled down in it. Krsna was the master statesman and politician of his times, and though he had all love and respect for his cousin Aristanemi, he remained a worldly man, while Aristanemi adopted the life of supreme renunciation of a Nirgrantha Sramana. The one was a Karma-yogin, the other a Dharma-yogin or Adhyātmayogin.
To be continued
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