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JAINA BIBLIOGRAPHY
is completely withdrawn from all earthly distractions, so that some Jain patriarchs are said to have been entirely impervious to vines twining around their limbs and ant-hills growing round their feet; it is a state of suspended animation amounting to a suspension of all bodily function, a slate in which, by the power of concentration, the fleshly body is cleansed to a point of alabastrine purity and assumes a perfection free of the dross of tangible matter.
In the figuration of such a concept the Indian sculptor employed certain techniques that were the common property of all craftsmen employed in making religious images in India. In order to convey the impression that we are looking at a superman, spiritually as well as anatomically above ordinary mortals, the body is composed on the metapherical basis used for the making of Buddha images; We can easily recognise the leonine body, the arms tapering like an elephant's trui k, the thighs like plaintains, as well as the lotiform eyes and other ideal abstraction for the features. The canon of proportion is an abstract one, too, composed of nine thalāmā, the distance from brow to chin, for the total height of the statue.
In the use of a mathematical system of measurement to ensure an appropriately ideal abstraction, the parallel to the Greek figure is a legitimate one. But in the Indian statue these means are dedicated to quite different ends. The Jain figure represents a spiritual, not an athletic ideal, Its nudity is conditioned by asceticism, not pride in physical beauty. Whereas in the Apollo the emphasis is on muscular structure, in the body of the Jain ascetic there is a complete suppression of muscular or skeletal structure even in an abstract way. The body and limbs are composed of a number of smooth, uniterrupted convex surfaces or planes, the swelling roundness of which not only connotes the perfection attained by breath control, but, in the reduction of the anatomical structure itself to the simplest possible surfaces, indicates that the form is composed of "some supraterrestrial unearthly substance". (H. Zimmrs, Philosophies of India, P. 212).
The stance of the Jain figure is intended to suggest the supernally motionless state of a being withdrawn in the timeless serenity of yoga, not the athletic vigour implied in the tension of the Greek statue. Even the hands extended down the legs suggest the infinite relaxation of trance in contrast to the surging vitality of the clenched fists of the Kouros.
P. 13. Surprisingly similar abstract means are used, on the one hand to suggest youthful beauty throbbing with physical life, and on the other hand a body as a symbol of spirit and an expression of complete withdrawal from all material being and the round of birth and death.
P. 13. The Male Nude :
Almost from the moment that it was unearthed at the ancient site of Harappa, the little limestone torso has been compared to the finest accomplishments of Greek
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