Book Title: Jaina Archaeology Outside India
Author(s): Jineshwardas Jain
Publisher: Bharat Varshiya Digambar Jain Mahasabha

View full book text
Previous | Next

Page 27
________________ Mahabharat and others. Even in the present day maps of Indonesia the name of Borneo is 'Kalimantan'. R.C.Majumdar [26] claims that the art of Java and Kambuja was no doubt derived from India and fostered by the Indian rulers of these colonies. It may be mentioned here that these epics are equally popular in Jain puranaas eg. Padampuran , Harivansha puran etc. All these great bas-reliefs are protected by their gallery roof; their freshness is well preserved, and their artistry is very fine [23]. Many jaina idols found here remind us of a shloka from a famous pooja verse; “Tirthankaron ke nhavan jal tein bhaye tirath sarvada, Ttatein pradakshin det surgan panchmerun ki sada. Do jaladhi dhai dveep mein sab ganat mool birajahi, poonjo assi dham pratima Hoho such dukh bhajahi" which conveys that' Religious centers spring up at places where baithing Ceremony (Head anointing) of tirthankara children is performed. On this occasion angels go around the five Meru temples'. Hence, it was quite logical to draw the conclusion that the birth places of many tirthankaras must be situated around the nearby regions and it is true also. This is the arial view of Angkor vat. (Fig. ) However, there is discrepancy between the number of temples 72 at present there and number 80 as per the sholka. In India, almost the jain temples have models of fivemrus in which, although the four smaller merus are of the same size but all the five merus contain 4 tirthankara statues in all the four levels of the merus, thus amounting to 80 numbers. In one panchmeru vidhan pooja, written by Poet Tekchand, [28], the 80 temples are situated as follows: 34 temples on Vaitadhya mountain 16 temples on Vijayardha mountain 4 temples on Roopachal mountain 6 temples on Kulachal mountain 16 temples on Vakshar mountain 4 temples on Gajdanta mountain The total of these comes to 80. In order to simplify there position for darsahn etc they have been depicted on the five merus itself. Five Meru temple (Angkorvat) was built to form four levels which are called as Bhadrasaal van, Panduk van, Sumanas van, and Nandan van starting from ground level. This 27

Loading...

Page Navigation
1 ... 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99 100 101 102 103 104 105