Mahavira and his Teaching

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

Page 330

THE ASCENDENCE & ECLIPSE OF BHAGAVĀN MAHĀVĪRA’S CULT 323
all attachments to, and joys of, life too, with the added injunction to mortify one's own flesh. It strove for the annihilation of the lower self, but interdicted even an unconscious injury to others' lower selves. On the positive side, it enjoined kindness to all creatures, including the minutest bacteria, and its food and hygienic regulations were based on this fundamental dogma. Even the Buddha, who attempted to practise it, left it off in favour of what he called a 'Middle Path'. 63. Nevertheless, tradition and epigraphy proclaim that the cult had thousands of followers of both sexes till at least the end of the 13th century after Christ in the Tamil areas. The 'Bhagavati-sūtra' (2-5) and the ‘Kalpa Sūtra (160-166) tell us that there were, even in the days of Pārsvanātha, 545,000 Sramaņas, wandering in groups under various leaders. There were, besides the above, hundreds of sages who had specialised in one sphere of knowledge or another,-kevalin, avadhi, the four pūrvas, perfection, transformations, prophesy and reading of past lives. [Dr. B. C. Law in 'Pārsvanātha, His Life and Doctrine”, Journal of Indian History] 64. The psychological cause for this paradoxical mass attraction was the clarion-call of Bhagvān Mahāvīra to all peoples, irrespective of caste, colour, creed or sex, to practise asceticism (tapas) to get themselves liberated from the cycle of births and deaths (Samsāra). The "Aupapātika Sūtra' says: "To all those Aryans and non-Aryans, he (the Jina) taught law untiringly." This freedom to perform tapas had seen denied to all except the male members of the three higher varnas in the popular Hinduism of that age, and it was even penal to do so. "The Uttara-Kānda' of the 'Rāmā yana' (Chapter 76, Sānti-Sadan, Edition, Translated by H. P. Šāstri, 1959, London), refers to the summary execution of such a 'sūdra' by Sri Rāma himself. Kāļidāsa in his 'Raghuvamsa' (Sarga 15), and Bhavabhūti, in his 'Uttararā macarita' (Act II), confirms the existence of such a penal law.
The secondary, though equally important, cause was the guarantee of protection by law to all tapasvins given by the Siśu