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Umakant P. Shah the Tirthankara was to be practically the same as the highest divinity of the other faith, for example, Rsabhanatha was hailed as Isana, Vamadeva, Tatpurusa or Aghora as has been done by the author of the Adipurana in the 8th century A. D. The Vedic Indra was assigned the function of celebrating the different Kalyanakus (Auspicious events of the Tirthanakaras.) But the idea of an Indra as a ruler of gods was extended and as many as sixty-four Indras grew up among whom Isanendra is noteworthy, Sakra or Saudhramendra is clearly the Vedic Sahasraksa Indra while the description of Isanendra shows that he is none else than Siva. At a later stage the Bhairavas and Yoginis and even Ganesa came to be included in Jaina worship. The Sixteen Jaina Mahavidyas :
The sixteen Mahavidyas form a group of Tantric goddesses worshipped both by the Savetambara and Digambara Jaina sects. Jaina traditions speak of as many as 48,000 vidyas out of which sixteen are reported to be the chief ones, Texts providing the Sadhana-vidhi of each of these sixteen vidyas are not yet traced, though Sandhanavidhis for a few are known, but belief in Mahavidyas seems to be ancient.
Both the Buddhist and the Jaina sources demonstrate the popularity of spells, magic, mantras, vidyas, science of divination, supernatural powers etc. in the time of Buddha and Mahavira, Alms obtained through the supernatural powers of mantra and vidya are prohibited for monks, in the Jaina canoncial texts. These texts refer to vidyas like antad-Thani, utpatani, jangoli-vijja (against snake-bites and poisons), the matanga-vilya (for telling past hist:ty) and so on. Varddhamanavidya, still popular, is an ancient Vidya, of which Sudhana-vidhis are available.
The Nisitha-Bhasya refers to two vidyas namely, Gauri and Gandhari, which according to the Brhat-Kalpa-Bhäşya are Matanga Vidyas.
The earliest known Jaina accounts of the oringin and worship of Vidyadevis and Vidyadharas are available in the Vasundevabiņdi (c. 400 A.D.), and in the Paumacariyam of Vimalasüri, Elaborate accounts of Nami and Vinami founding two groups Vidyadhara cities on the slopes of Vaitadhya mountain are also available in the Āvasyaka-curņi and the Āvasyakatika of Haribhadra suri, in the Caupanna maha-purisa-cariyam (868 A.D.) of Silanka, the Trisastisalakapurasacaritra of Haincandra (c. 1100-1167 A.D.), in Digambara work Harivamsa of Jinasen (783— 4 A.D.) and so on. There were sixteen clans or groups of Vidyadharas named after the classes of vidyās they possessed. Hemacandra's list of sixteen classes of Vidyas practically agrees with the earlier list given by Sanghadasa gani in his Vasudevahindi. According to the Vasudevahindi, the vidyas originally belonged to the Gandharvas and the Pannagas and included vidyas like Maha-Rohini, Pannati
.
1, For a detailed discussion on this see, Shah, U.P., Iconography of the sixteen Jaina Maha
vidyas, Journal of the Indian Society of Oriental Art, Vel, XV, pp. 114-177
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