Mahaviras Word

Author(s): Walther Shubring
Publisher: L D Indology Ahmedabad

Page 46

The Canon of the Svetambara Jainas
exact knowledge of everything they do, their past and their future, however, arises at least out of the urge for knowledge on the part of the listeners and the urge to communicate on the part of the speaker. For, without doubt it was a case of outdoing the opponent with regard to supernatural matters. Thus, in the conclusion of a single case, when the god Camara decides to put an end to Sakka's lustful activity and attacks him with Mahavira's consent, but who then in the face of the lightning hurled by Sakka flees back to him (Mahāvīra), as a result of which the god is still able to catch hold of the missile in flight and apologizes to the master-the general capability of the gods to catch hold of an object in flight is dealt with (3, 2). That gods get over mountains or a wall which are in their way (14, 5) is almost taken for granted. But what is almost hardly granted is that they bring about dances on someone's eye-lashes (divvam battisaiviham naṭṭa-vihim uvadamsettae), or that Sakka can take the head of a person temporarily, in both cases without those concerned having a problem because of it (14, 8). The descriptions, though, are also of purely earthly matters. The system of doctrines which Mahāvira built up makes him know about the wind as arising ultimately through the instigation on the part of the wind gods (5, 1), that of rain through the command of Pajjanna and Sakka, that of eclipse, on the other hand, through the order of Isana to the officials who carry it out (14, 2), the explanation of the light of day and the darkness of the night from the condition of the smallest particles of matter (5, 9), and many other (things); the appearance of the red morning sun leads to the declaration that the god Suriya and his glow are identical (14, 9). But we also hear about the duration of the ability to germinate of certain seeds which are preserved sealed up, and immediately following this, about the number of breaths within an hour, which then leads further to a discussion on the measure of time (6, 7) and on the cause of the internal sounds with a galloping horse (10, 3). Apparently here too, as in numerous other cases, competition required the ability to give exact information and the wisdom of an ignoramus was unknown.
All these remarks concern what in the Viyahapannatti brings us closer to Mahāvira's humanity, and so it is obvious to ask whether the doctrines proclaimed there and elsewhere, together with the dogmatic technical language traceable back to him, until otherwise proved, entail traces of a mode of expression personally his own. The question is to be answered in the
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A fragment of the same incident is included in the Jivabhigama because of the word poggala (869a, of the old 1884 Benares edition (the Ladnun ed. does not give the corresponding page (WB))).