Jain Journal 2001 04

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

Page 15

MISHRA : THE DATE OF MAHAVIRA
159 day as Canda Pradyota of Avanti. Thus "the founder of the Jaina faith must have seen Darsaka's reign (i.e., 437-413 B.C.), if it be true tha both Vardhamana and Canda died about the same time." (pp. 124125)
This view can be easily refuted on the basis of what has already been said.
(G) H.C. Seth17 suggests 488 B.C. as the date of Mahavira's death on the basis of the Buddhist tradition, assuming 487 B.C. as the date of the Buddha's death. As he says,
“The great difficulty in accepting 468 B.C. as the date for Mahavira's nirvāṇa will be that it will place Mahavira's death several years after that of Buddha. The traditions preserved in the Buddhist Pali canon clearly tell us that Nigantha Nataputta i.e., Mahavira, died at Pava a little before Buddha. 18 Jacobi and Charpentier have rather lightly set aside this old Buddhist tradition.” (p. 820)
“The traditional chronology of the Svetämbara Sect of the Jainas given in the Tapagaccha Pattāvalīand Merutunga's Vicāraśreni, which has been made familiar by European scholars like Buhler, Jacobi, and Charpentier, puts Mahavira nirvana 470 years before the Vikrama era. (pp. 817-18)
"All the Jaina traditions assign 40 years of reign to Nahavana or Nahapana, whose reign therefore lasted upto 605 years (430 between Mahavira's nirvana and Vikrama+135 of Vikrama's dynasty+40 of Nahavana) after Mahavira nirvana." (p. 834).
Now his main argument is as follows :
17. Mahavira nirvana and some other important dates in Ancient Indian
History in Bharata Kaumadi, Part II (Allahabad, 1947), pp. 817-838. H.C. Seth's other articles on ancient Indian chronology include : 'Buddha nirvana and other dates in Ancient Indian Chronology', Indian Culture, Vol. 5 (1938-1939), pp. 305-317; 'Beginning of Chandragupta Maurya's Reign', Proceedings of the 3rd Indian History Congress (1939), p. 371; also republished in Journal of Indian History, Vol. 19 (1940) pp. 17-21; 'Chronology of Asokan Inscriptions', Journal of Indian History, Vol. 17,
Part III. 18. Digha Nikaya, III, pp. 117, 209; and Majjhima Nikaya, II, pp. 243ff. We
are told here that while Buddha stayed at Samagama, the report was brought to him that his rival had died at Pava, and that the Nirgranthas, his followers, were divided by serious schisms. According to Jain traditions also Mahavira died at Pava. (H.C. Seth).