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negative and positive virtues. The Sāṁkhya, the Yoga, Buddhism and Jainism agree on this point.
The protests against animal sacrifice were more pronounced and vehement from the Buddhists and the Jainas. The Buddha was against animal sacrifice and the rituals. He described the priests as 'tricksters' and using holy words for pay. In the Maha vagga we get a description of the instructions the Buddha gave to the disciples regarding the acceptance of food." He asked his disciples not to injure any animal on a purpose or for sport." In Asoka's edicts we get regulations for the protection of animals and birds, forests were not to be burnt, not even chaff containing living things. However, the protests from the Jainas were more vehement and explicit. In fact non-violence is the cardinal principle of Jainism : Ahimsā paramo dharmaḥ. It has now been clear that non-violence has been preached by the Jainas much earlier than Mahavira. Uttaradhyayana Sutra gives the description of the meeting of Kesi, a disciple of Pārsva, and Gautama, a disciple of Vardhamāna, for a discussion regarding the agreement in the doctrines of the two Prophets.98 Pārsva was the twenty-third Tirthankara who lived about two hundred and fifty years before Vardhamāna. He preached four moral injuctions or Vratas. Ahimsā was one of them. Vardhamana carried the traditions of Parsva and added one more Vrata." It appears that ahissä as a moral injuction must have been a pre-Aryan principle which was later assimilated in the Aryan way of life. The Jainas made nonviolence the most fundamental principle of their religious life They made a systematic analysis of the principle, almost to the point of making it a science. All other moral injunctions were subordinated to ahimsā.
91. Rhys Davids. Buddhist India, p. 215. 92. The Vinaya Texts, XVIII, p. 117. 93. Uttaradhyayana Sūtra, XXIII and Comments by Jacobi in S. B. E.
Vol. XLV. Part II, p. 193. 94. History of Pre-Buddhist Indian Philosophy, Barua. Ch. XXVI.
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