Jain Journal 1972 01

Author(s): Jain Bhawan Publication
Publisher: Jain Bhawan Publication

Page 43

JANUARY, 1972
121
Accounts of India, Calcutta, 1960, p. 425). It is told by Onesikritus, the philosopher of the School of Diogenes the cynic that one of the naked sophists Kalanus “is said to have received him very rudely and to have proudly bidden him to take off his clothes and speak to him naked, as otherwise he would not hold any conversation with him, even if he came from Zeus himself.” (Plutarch's Lives of Alexander and Caesar, as cited before, p. 367). Plutarch has further recounted that when Dandamis, another of the Gymnosophists was told of Sokrates. Pythagoras, and Diogenes, "said that they appeared to him to have been wise men, but to have lived in too great bondage to the laws.” (Op. Cit., p. 367). This attitude towards life and living and the emphasis on the freedom from bondage will support the view that the Sramaņas belonging to Gymnosophists referred to by Stobaeus included the Jainas. If this is reviewed in actual perspective the site of Topra was befittingly selected by Asoka for his Seventh Pillar Edict. The milieu of religions and sects also might have included the Ajivikas whose last Tirthankara was Gosala Mankhaliputra.