Mahavira and his Teaching

Author(s): C C Shah, Rishabhdas Ranka, Dalsukh Malvania
Publisher: Bhagwan Mahavir 2500th Nirvan Mahotsava Samiti

Page 104

BHAVYATVA AND ABHAVYATVA
state of the liberated souls (siddhas). Sobering as these thoughts may be for those who are given to over-confidence regarding their spiritual achievements, the doctrine cannot but have a most debilitating effect on the spiritual career of an aspirant who must always live with a terrible uncertainty regarding his status as a bhavya or an abhavya.
It is unlikely that a doctrine of such blatant predestination could have become part of the tradition without giving rise to some controversy, however mild, about its validity and its compatibility with other Jain tenets of bondage and freedom. Unfortunately we know of only a single work, namely, the Visesavas paka-bhāṣ ya of ācārya Jinabhadra (6th cent. A.D.), which contains a rather meagre treatment of this topic. In a short but celebrated part of this work entitled the Ganadharavāda2 (v.v. 1549-2024) there appear some seventeen verses (1820-1836) devoted to the controversy of bhavya and abhavya. The question is put by Mandika, the sixth ganadhara, prior to his conversion to Jainism By Bhagavan Mahāvīra.
Their supposed dialogue, in the light of Maladhāri Hemacandra's Vivarana (1231 A.D.),3 brings out some salient points of the controversy:
Question: Is the union of jiva and karma eternal like that of jīva and ākāśa (space), or non-eternal (i.e. without a beginning but with an end) like that of gold and dirt?
Answer: Both these examples aic correct and there is no contradiction in it. The former (eternal) refers to the abhavya souls whereas the latter (non-eternal) refers to the bhavya souls
Samayasāra 273, 274; Atmakhyātitikā, 275, Viseṣāvasyakabhāṣya 1219 also Vivarana
Gaṇadharavada, Translation and explanation, by E. A. Solomon, Gujarat Vidya Sabha, Ahmedabad 1966.
I have used the text of the Gaṇadharavāda as given in Solomon's edition. She also gives a literal translation of the Vivarana.
Gaṇadharavada 1820-21 ab.
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