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106
Lord Mahâvîra
of a succession of twenty-four Jinas is parallel and perhaps previous to that of Avataras, but its basic assumptions are different. The parallel is really with the twenty-four Buddhas before Gautama, and Jainism probably provided the pattern for this late Buddhist theory, which, as we have seen, was first propounded as comprising seven Buddhas.
Jainism is not humanistic, any more than Buddhism is. It does not teach self-salvation, but dependence upon a supernatural truth revealed the omniscient and adorable transcendent beings. However this could not guarantee long popular appeal. The Jains had considerable following for a time, and rich and powerful patrons, but Hinduism won back most of its converts by attacks on the intellectual and religious planes. Sankara attacked the Jain doctrine of the non-universality of the Self, and Ramanuja disputed the error of supposing that Being can originate from Non-being, quoting the Upanishads in his support. He criticized both Jains and Buddhists for refusing to philosophize and taking refuge in ambiguity, saying 'May be it is. May be it is not. May be it is and is not'.12
But the most serious opposition to Jainism and Buddhism in India came from the theistic religions, both Vaishnavite and Saivite. One of the great saivite teachers of south India, Sampantar, was said to have been born in answer to the prayer of his parents that he might win back those who had abandoned theism for Jainism and Buddhism, and sons of his followers call him an Avtar of one of the sons of Siva. Sampantar won back the king of counts to saivism, and with his younger contemporary Appar aroused many people in Tarnil country to bhakti devotion. At the same time the Vaishnavite poets, singing of the love manifested in the Avatars of Vishnu, reinforced the popular appeal of theism even further. Eventually Buddhism almost disappeared from India, and Jainism shrank to a mere million or so adherents, before the powerful Hindu Avatar faith and theism.
1. Kalpa Sutra, 21off.; A. Guerinot, La Religion Djaina, 1926, pp. 100f. Vishnu Purâna, 2, 1.
2.
3.
See the table of Jinas in J. Jaini, Outlines of Jainism, 1940, facing p.6 Kalpa Sutra, 1ff.
4.
5.
Kalpa Sutra, 46, 73f.
6.
W. Schubring, The Doctrine of the Jainas, trs. W. Beurlen, 1962, p. 61.
