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Iconography of 24 Tirthankaras
135 He is said to have obtained nirvāņa on Mt. Sammeta. Yakşeśvara (Dig.) or Yakşanāyaka (Sve.) and Vajraśrókhala (Dig.) or Kälika (Šve) are the attendant yaksa and yaksini respectively who are said to protect the śäsana or the Jaina Samgha of this Tirthankara. The chief ganadhara of this Jina was Vajranābha while Ajitä was the chief äryikā. Abhinandana had the monkey as his dovaja or lañchana. B.C. Bhattacharya, in his Jaina Iconography, writes: "In treating of his symbolism, we encounter some difficulties. His main symbol is a monkey. If we interpret hari, one of the dreams of Jina's mothers, to stand for a monkey, the propriety of the emblem is explained. Hari also means a lion, which makes it a symbol of Mahāvira. The real nature of his Yaksa and Yakşiņi may, to some extent, help us to get at the meaning of the symbols. Yakşa, as we have seen, is Isvara and Yakşiņi is named Kali. Clearly they are Saivite deities borrowed from the Brahmanic pantheon. Thus it is likeliest to connect the ape of the Jina with the apish incarnation of Isvara or Siva."80
The above remarks are too far-fetched. There does not seem to have existed any special connection between the lañchanas and the Sasanadevatās of the different Tirthankaras. Only in the case of Rsabha the similarities of Rsabha-Siva, Bull-Nandi, Gomukha-Nandikeśvara are noticeable. But what about Rsabha's yaksi Cakreśvari who can be equated with Vaişnavi and not with the Saivite Gauri? How can we connect the horse symbol of Sambhava with the Jina's yaksa Trimukha? The relation of Isvara Yaksa and Kāli can be understood but not of these two with the ape cognizance. In fact, the recognising symbols or the lañchanas-the dhivajas-were introduced much earlier than the twenty-four different yakşas and yakşiņis known as Sasanadevatās. There was no inherent significance or background nor was any uniform principal followed in the selection of such names and symbols. We cannot associate Gomukha with Cakreśvari in the same way as we can Iśvara with Käli. To seek any significance in the Jañchanas from the list of fourteen or sixteen dreams seen by the Jina's mother is equally unwarranted.
Images of Abhinandana are not so common as those of Rşabha, Pārsva or Mahāvīra and not many have reached the different museums from old sites. However it would not be proper to state that he was not popular, for, a glance at different articles and works giving inscriptions on the various stone and metal images in worship in different temples and Jaina temple-cities will show that images of all the twenty-four Tirthankaras used to be worshipped.
Abhinandana is represented on one of the four sides of the Quadruple image in the Son Bhandara cave, Rajgir, referred to before while describing images of Sambhavanātha.
A relief sculpture of Abhinandana with the ape symbol also figures on the wall of the Navamuni Cave. Khandagiri, Orissa. Abhinandana also figures on the walls of the Barabhuji (Fig. 53) and the Mahāvira Caves, Khandagiri, Orissa.
Only one sculpture of Abhinandana, with the cognizance of a monkey, is so far known from Devgadh. The Jina is shown in the kāyotsarga mudra. The yakşa and the yakși on the pedestal are of the usual two-armed variety showing the abhaya and the kalasa.
At Khajuraho, a sculpture of this Jina in the sitting posture figures in the Pārsvanātha temple while another image is preserved in Temple 29. In both cases the yakşa and the yakşi, each two-armed, show the abhaya and the fruit or the kalasa.
In the Mālava-Prantiya-Digambara-Jaina-Samgrahālaya, Ujjain, are preserved a few sculptures of Ajitanātha standing in the kāyotsarga mudră with the kapi (ape) shown as his lañchana.
At Kumbharia, an inscription on the pedestal of an image of Abhinandana shows that it was installed in samvat 1142=1085 A.D. The image was installed in the Mahāvira svāmi temple (Viśālavijaya, op. cit., p. 121, inscr. no. 6-69). Similarly in cell no. 22, Pārsvanātha temple, Kumbharia, was installed an image of Abhinandana in samvat 12591202 A.D. In the Santinātha temple at Rädhanpur, N. Gujarat, is in worship a metal Pañca-tirthika image of Abhinandana installed in samvat 1505=1448 A.D. Minister Dhanapāla, a descendent of the family of the elder brother of Vimala Saha, had installed a sculpture of Abhinandana in cell no. 26, Vimala Vasahi, in Samvat 1245.
In the National Museum, New Delhi, No. 48.4/88 is a metal sculp ure of Abhinandana, dated samvat 1610 with figures of Isvara yakşa and Káli yakși on the ends of simhāsana (JAA, III, p. 560).
Sculptures of Abhinandana are obtained in South India in Karnataka in the sets of 24 Tirthankaras
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