Jinamanjari 2000 04 No 21

Author(s): Jinamanjari
Publisher: Canada Bramhi Jain Society Publication

Page 24

Jaina society flourished without hindrance for such a long period under one particular king. The only parallel example would be of Amõghavarşa. Like him, Vikramāditya was also born and bread, and educated in a Jaina atmosphere, molded in the Jaina crucible. Scores of charters speak of his and his vassals who made gifts and gave endowments to the Jaina sanctuaries and monasteries. Hundreds of new basadis were commissioned and many more renovated.
Enthusiastic Jaina pious votaries expended their wealth on basadis, tanks, reservoirs, channels, feeding houses and digging wells. In their frenzy for glory, Jains had built too many temples - constructed north to south and east to west, marking an effective penetration of Jaina activities in Cāļukyan territory. Perhaps at a later stage they realized that their ancestors had spent too much of wealth and energy on places of prayer.
The Cāļukya rulers gave a distinct character to Jaina art and architecture. The temples and caves of this period are in fact a precursor to a distinct Jaina style that was translated into a more elaborate, impressive and integrated style during the later periods of the Hoysalas, where it reached its zenith in decorative element.
The Yāpaniya sangha flourished during these years. It followed the middle path of bridging the gulf between the two extremes - Digamabara and Svētāmbara traditions - within the orbit of Jaina philosophy and code of conduct. This sangha had started its chapter in Karnataka at Kalyāņa in Bidar district and by fifth century it had assumed the position of receiving royal reception from the Early Kadambas. It grew from strength to strength upto the period of Kalacuris and Călukyas. The period between C. E. 980 and 1180 was the golden age of Yāpaniya sangha; that was the best of time, and the year after 1184 C.E was the worst of time.
The Yāpaniyas transmitted a very rich Nirgrantha cultural tradition exercising their sway for over eight hundred years in Karnataka. Like their predecessors, the Cāļukyas widened unstilted patronage to Jainism..
Towards the closing decades of the Cāļukyas, things did not move well with Jainism, desperately struggling against hostile forces. It was hardly able to establish structures of the size and splendor of the Gangas and the Rāstrakūtas, and even that of the Cāļukya period upto C.E. 1184. They could at best safeguard their cultural inheritance through restoration of the disintegrated structures. do
BIBLIOGRAPHY
1. S.A. Bhuvanendra Kumar (ed) Jinamañjari, Vol.10, No.2, 1994. 2. P.B. Desai, Jainism in South India and Some Jaina Epigraphs: Solapur, 1957. 3. G. Jawaharlal, Jainism in Andhra, 1994. 4. Kamala Hampana, Attimabbe and Cāļukyas, Bangalore, 1995. 5. Nagarajiah Hampa, The Later Gangas: Mandali Thousand, Bangalore 1999; Aprops of Vikramaditya-VI and Jainism, Tumkur, 1999; Jina Pārsva Temples in karnataka, Hombuja, 1999; Yāpaniya Sangha (Kannada), Hampi, 1999. 6. M.S. Nagaraja Rao (ed), The Calukyas of Kalyāņa, Bangalore 1983. 7. Padmanabh S. Jaini, The Jain Path of Purification, Berkeley, 1979. 8.B.A. Saletore, Medieval Jainism, Poona, 1938. 9. A.N. Upadhye, Upadhye Papers, Mysore University, 1981.
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