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26
Lord Mahåvira
non-productive privileged class. In order to look after the interest of this class, laws are enacted, police and military systems are introduced—in other words the conception of state becomes materialized. This did not escape the notice of Mahâvîra or the Buddha as is proved by their discourses on the origin and functioning of the state.
The contemporaries of the Buddha and Mahâvîra were overwhelmed by the stupendous social transformation of the age, the collapse of the tribal institutions, the rise of new values ushered in by the state-powers and the new forces of injustice and untruth-and they tried to understand the problems in their own ways. Overwhelmed by bloodshed and massacre, Purana and Pakudha thought that there was no difference between merit and demerit, between violence and non-violence. Ajita could not distinguish between the fool and the wise, for both were doomed to death, and Sanjaya preferred to keep himself silent since the deeply ingrained faiths behind the ideas were all uprooted. Gosala, the leader of the Ajivikas, became a fatalist who was forced to believe that human activity could do nothing to change the course of events. Everything appeared to him to have been determined by forces of fate or destiny. He died of despair and madness pinning in his delirium for the last drink (carime pane), the last song (carime geye), the last dance (carime natte) and the last greetings (carime arijalikamme)-characteristics of simple undifferentiated trible life.
Most of the philosophical schools belonging to the Buddhist Purvanta and Aparanta Kalpikas which corresponded to the different groups of Akiryavadines mentioned in the Jain texts were baffled. Their traditional beliefs and ideas, the values which they stood for were shattered into pieces before their very eyes. The unprecedented violence and terror led them to believe that all human actions endeavours were fruitless. The Adhiccasamuppannikes failed to put any trust on the law of causation; the Ajnanavadins or Amaravikkhepikas declined to give any categorical answer to the questions relating to life and universe. The followers of the various doctrines of non-action mainly speculated on what remained after the extermination of the mortal body. The extremists like the Ucchedavadins or
