Mahavira and his Teaching

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

Page 321

314 K. A. NILAKANȚA SĀSTRI & V. RĀMASUBRAMANIAM, 'AUNDY infinite "grace of God Siva, the personal deity of the entire Universe. It was further added that the said Lord had never failed to respond to the call of his mystic-saints. Whether this mysticism satisfied the Pandya or not, the doors of the temple of Madhurai were thrown open at once for public worship. 44. But it was not so simple for the populace. A miracle never fails to intoxicate a mob. The citizens of Madhurai divided themselves into rival factions,-Saivites and Jainas,--each glamouring for a more crucial test. Each party agreed to throw into the Vaigai river-flood a palm-leaf manuscript of their respective sacred texts, and await the result. The Jaina palm-leaf, it is stated, was washed away, while the Saivite script, containing a hymn of the boy-saint, floated against the current and stopped at a place a few yards up the river. The wager was the impalement of the defeated party. Eight thousand Jainas, the Saivite chronicles declare, were thus disposed of. 45. The above story occurs in three different Tamil Hindu chronicles and in a Sanskrit 'Halāsya-Māhātmya'. All composed three centuries after the date of the alleged genocide, the plausibility of the one copying or at least influencing the other not being ruled out. It is irrefutably clear, however, that all the four are later Hindu chauvinistic literature, specifically composed to glorify the ‘might of Siva, rather than his grace. It is true that the chronicles contain historical material. But they can never be history. The episode of the mass impalement could never have been condoned by Gnānasambandha. Much less permitted by an ex-Jaina ruler in his own territory. The Jainas themselves would never have agreed to the wager itself, because it involved the possibility of murdering their rivals. We may, however, concede that a Hindu mob, intoxicated by the delirium of triumph, could have perpetrated such an atrocity on a few Jainas, the rest having fled.
1.
The kalpa sūtra and other Jaina literature mention the existence of thousands of disciples to the Tirtharkaras. Jaina tradition also tells us that, after the return of Bhadrabāhu to Magadha from the South,