Life and Stories of Jaina Savior Parcvanatha

Author(s): Maurice Bloomfield
Publisher: Maurice Bloomfield

Page 11

PREFACE
The publication in India, in the year 1912, of Bhāvadevasūri's Pārçvanātha Caritra opens out, for the first time, a more connected and complete account of the life and supposed teachings of the penultimate Jaina Tīrthamkara, or Savior, Pārçva or Pārçvanātha. The lives of the twenty-two Saviors preceding Pārçva are pure myth. The last Tirthamkara, Vardhamāna or Nirgrantha Jñātrputra, best known as Vīra or Mahāvīra, presumably a historical personage, regarded by the Jainas as the real founder of their religion, is supposed to have lived either in the last half of the sixth, or in the first half of the fifth century B. C. Pārçvanātha is said to have preceded Vira by only 250 years,” a passably moderate time, as Hindu time conceptions go. But beyond the persistent and, on the whole, unitarian character of his story and his teaching, there is little to show that he was an historical personage. Be this as it may, the doctrines ascribed to Pārçva are fundamental in Jaina religion, and Pārçva's personality figures large in the Jaina legend and in Jaina consciousness. The life of Pārgva, including his nine pre-births, as presented in Bhāvadeva's work, is the first complete account of Pārçvanātha published to the Western world. And his account of Pārçva's life, along with the many stories woven into it, adds to the chain of Hindu fiction books a jewel of no mean price.
* Prakrit Nātaputta or Nåyaputta, turned erroneously into Sanskrit Jáătaputra or Jõātiputra; in Sanskrit the correct Jñātņputra does not figure. See Jacobi, Indian Antiquary, ix. 158 ff.
• The Jainas say that he was born 817 B. c.
is