Note On Class Of Ascetics Called Unmajjaka

Author(s): A Wezler
Publisher: A Wezler

Page 17

The class of ascetics called unmajjaka
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prarūḍham forms part of ascetic diet in general. Therefore I deem it a much more plausible solution that the unmajjakas are allowed to use only implements that are made of a material which is directly and intimately connected with, and dependent on water, viz. material obtained from vegetal life, plants in general and in particular the largest and most important among them, namely trees. It is in this connection that I regard the 'myth' about Cyavana as particularly instructive: The relation between the vanaprasthas practising udavasa and 'their' chosen element", water, is so intimate, their becoming a part of acquatic life so intensive, that any material alien or even opposed to water is ruled out as a matter of course, so to say.
In concluding the present note let me draw attention to yet another problem connected with this particular form of self-mortification which too seems to have been overlooked in previous research, if I am not mistaken. It is true that in India since of old fire and water have not been viewed exclusively, perhaps not even mainly, as elements. opposed to each other, but fire even as originating from water. Nevertheless, even if Vedic mythical ideas should still have been a living tradition at the time when the practice of the unmajjakas came into existence, the very idea of tapas as accumulation of heat, fiery energy, within oneself is not really, at least not simply, compatible with a practice of self-mortification that consists in udaväsa. But that this latter practice formed part of what was called tapas stands beyond doubt. One cannot hence help drawing the final conclusion that is suggested by other forms of asceticism, too, like e.g. living on water or air only, etc. that the conception of tapas qua asceticism did not, or perhaps did not any longer at a certain period of time, by itself exclusively refer to the practice of heating oneself up in the literal sense of the word, and this is what is also actually attested in the texts at our disposal. But it is quite possible that one has to go even a step further and to draw the more far reaching - conclusion that the subtle substance accumulated by practising tapas was not only, or always, considered as having a fiery nature, and that hence text passages which speak of tapasvins sending forth flames of fire, etc., are to be relativized as regards their testimonial value: they may simply be due to the fact that the old, and original, idea of asceticism as tapas, i.e. "heating oneself up", was kept alive as just one of the various ideas, or strands, which taken together have ultimately formed the highly complex phenomenon which continued to be called tapas in spite of the fact that it had assumed a markedly different character in the course of its historical development.
97. On the elements water, fire and wind as welcome means for ascetics to end their life by see e.g. Mbh. 15.45.27.