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Life and Teaching of Mahavira
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between the two groups. After the famine was over, a council was convened at Pataliputra to patch up the differences and in this council a Jaina canon called the Siddhanta was framed.
In order to collect all the Jaina scriptures and to systematise them another council was summoned at Vallabhi in Gujarat and the present Jaina religious book, the Svetambaras, consisting of 12 pages was the result. The followers of Sthulabhadra wore white clothes and were thus known as Svetambaras. The followers of Bhadrabahu went naked and were called Digambaras.
The early Jaina literature was written in Prakrit which was replaced by Sanskrit from the seventh century A.D. In the Tamil literature the Jaina poets are accorded a high position. The JivakaChintamani, the finest of the Tamil poems, was the work of a Jaina. The Jainas also made the Tamil grammar and the Tamil dictionary. But strangely enough the Jaina literature or the Jaina religion was not popular. As Winternitz observes: “With rare exceptions, the sacred book of the Jainas are written in as-dry-asdust, matter-of-fact and didactic tone. Hence important as they are for the specialist, they cannot claim the interest of the general reader to anything approaching so great an extent.” Jainism flourished and confined itself for a long period in south and western India, but did not strike its roots in the outer world.
Contribution of Jainism
In the field of social reforms the Jainas occupy a preeminent place. They were the first to discard the caste system of the erstwhile Hindu society and the rituals and sacrifices of Hindu religion. This has rightly been pointed out by Dr R.S. Sharma: "Jainism made the first serious attempt to mitigate the evils of the varna order (caste system) and the ritualistic Vedic religion.” Thus the Jainas gave a preeminent position to all men of the society and for this reason like Buddhism it had a universal value. So Dr. S. Radhakrishnan rightly said: “Jainism emphasised the potential divine stature of man and its teaching claims to be of universal application."
The Jainas have played a very important role in the linguistic development of the country. Şanskrit has all along been the medium of sacred writings and preaching of the brahmanas as Pali had been that of the Buddhists. But the Jainas utilised the
