Jain Rup Mandan

Author(s): Umakant P Shah
Publisher: Abhinav Publications

Page 26

Introduction
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translated above, that the Caitya was in the udyāna called Amraśālavana. And then later the text says in sutras 3-5 that in the centre of this forest-grove was the Aśoka-tree. So where was the walled Caitya of sūtra 2?
It is reasonable to suppose that in the different vacanas of the Jaina canon some portions of the original texts might have been lost and some were not understood or misunderstood. To us it appears that two stages in the evolution of the Pūrṇabhadra Caitya are here mixed up. In the first stage, there was no walled structure around the object of worship which was none else than the Prthvi-Sila-Pata under the Caitya-tree. It was open on all sides and at the most there was a railing around as we see a caitya-tree with a railing in the Ayigapata set up by an unknown donor (Smith, Jaina Stupa ..., pl. IX, p. 16 and Shah, U.P., Studies in Jaina Art, fig. 11, pp. 81-82). In the next stage perhaps there was a big platform around the tree and the simhasana with the pata was on the platform (Coomaraswamy, HIIA, figs. 41, 46, 51; Barua, B.M., Book of Bharhut, III, figs. 26, 28, 30, 31).
The Mahabharata (Santiparva 69.42) forbids even the felling of leaves of trees that are known as Caityas. Mm. Kane (History of Dharmasastra, II, p. 895) here interprets Caitya as "trees like the Asvattha that have a platform (caitya) built for them." Coomaraswamy cites a case where, in explaining the Suciloma Sutta of Samyutta Nikaya, II.5, a stone dias, stone, or platform (tankite mañco) is stated to have been Yakkha's haunt (bhavanam).70 Coomaraswamy writes, "most of the Yakkhacetiya referred to in Buddhist and Jaina literature may have been sacred trees."71 The Vasudevahindi (c. 400-450 A.D.) supplies definite evidence in support of the above inference. According to this text, there was, in Säliggama in the Magadha Janapada, an udyana called Manorama. Therein was the Jakkha Sumano, whose stone-plaque or platform (sila sila) was placed there under an Aśoka tree, the sila was known as Sumana. There the people worshipped this Yaksa (tattha Sumano nima Jakkho tassa Asogapayavasamsiyā Sila Sumana tattha nam jana puyanti-Vasudevahindi, p. 85). A certain person, Satya by name, is further said to have spent a night in meditation in this area (siläpaesa, ibid., p. 88) of the Sumanasilä, standing in the kayotsarga pose, to propitiate this Yaksa.
The Sila-pata, placed on the simhasana, became a spot for laying offerings to the spirit of the tree. Nay, it also became the pitha for representation of a spirit (or deity) or of a symbol as can be inferred from a relief of a Dhamma-cakka shrine from Bharhut, illustrated by Coomaraswamy (HIIA, fig. 41). At some stage the object of worship was carved on the Sila itself and offerings placed on it, e.g. the Ayagapatas illustrated in Figs. 10 and 11 which have in each a figure of a Tirthankara in its centre.
These Yakṣa-caityas were open on all sides but at some stage stone umbrellas supported by a staff in the centre were introduced to serve as roofs over these Sila-patas or images of deities placed on such Šila-patas. At some stage images of Yaksas or other deities were worshipped under such Caitya trees and walls were raised on all the four sides72 and there were entrance gates with toranas, as described in the Aupapätika sutra, sūtra 2, noted above. It would mean that still the shrine could be visited from any of the four directions on account of entrance gates facing the four directions.
Another stage in the worship of the Caitya-vṛkia can be imagined in the erection of a pitha or platform with a Sila-pata or an image on each of the four sides of the tree. 73 This served as the basis of the conception of a Caturmukha shrine. Such an inference is confirmed by the elaborate account of Caitya-vrkṣas in the Samavasarana of Adin itha described by Jinasena in his Adipuriņa. According to this text, they are Caitya-vrkṣas because at their roots are placed on four sides four images of the Jinas.74
In Jaina canons the stock description of a Jaina temple is that of the Siddhayatana. The Siddhāyatana to the N.E. of the Sudharma Sabhi of Vijayadeva was 13 yojanas in length and six yojanas and one krośa (about half of the length) in breadth and nine yojanas in height. It had on it, above the entrance doorway, the vedika-panel motif and an arch, surmounted by silabhanjik is; it had beautiful pillars of Vaiḍurya gems, its floor inlaid with gems and gold and silver, its walls decorated with figures of mythical animals (ihämrga), oxen, kinnaras (half-men and half-horses or birds), crocodiles, birds, dragons, winged-deer (sarabha), yaks (camara), elephants, creepers and lotus-rhizomes. The abacus of columns had crowning figures of vidyadhara-pairs, with mechanism to show them moving. The shrine was adorned with thousands of sculptures or reliefs and with many domes (thabhiya), the tops decorated with