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130
JAINISM AND KARNĀTAŽA CULTURE
Similarly, the Kalpa Sūtra, attributed to Bhadrabāhu, states : He with equanimity bore, underwent, suffered all pleasant and unpleasant occurrences arising from divine powers, men or animals; for it is said of an ascetic in the last stage of his spiritual career that he does desire neither life nor death. The same severe code must have been followed upto Bhadrabahu who was the last of the Śrutakévalis.9 But under Sthūlabhadra who convened the Council of Pataliputra the rigour was mitigated and the Digambaras disapproved of the change.10 The controversy appears to have continued for some time even among the Svetāmbaras. For, Ārya Mahāgiri, the immediate successor of Sthūlabhadra in the Svetämbara apostolate, being a stricter ascetic, is said to have reverted to the "ideal practice of nakedness.” There was reaction again under Suhastin, and Āryamahāgiri retired to Daśärņabhadra out of sheer disgust.11 The new doctrine, however, gained royal support from Aśoka's grandson Samprati, under whom, as we saw, the first Svetämbara mission was sent to the South. Thus, from very early times, both these schools of Jaina thought found representation in the South; but by far the most overwhelming epigraphic and archaeological evidence in the South is of the Digambara Sect.12
Despite these and other differences (with which, however, we need not trouble ourselves here ) 13 the great Jaina community which came to the South had many things in common, especially in their fundamental doctrines and outlook on life.
8 Kaipa Sütra, 117; ibid. Rules for Yatis, p. 51. 9 Cf. Devasena, Darsagagāra, vy. 12-15 ; cf. Peterson, Report on San.
M88. III, p. 24. 10 Jacobi, op. cit., p. xliii. 11 Cf. Stevenson, op. cit., p. 74; Barodia, History and Literature of
Jainism, p. 55. 12 The earliest lithic reference to the S'vetām baras in South India is
found in an inscription of badamba Mrigésavarma, Ind. Ant. VII, p. 38. Another is in Ep. Car. II, 8B 254. In the former they are
called 'S'tēla patha' in the latter Sitāmbara'. 18 See Bühler, op. cit., pp. 1-3; Jaini, The Jaisa Gavette XX, pp. 98-5.
