Religion and Culture of the Jains

Author(s): D C Sirkar
Publisher: University of Calcutta

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PROCEEDINGS OF THE SEMINAR-SECOND DAY
omissions in Dr. Singh's treatment of the subject. He particularly referred to the Kauleśvari hill under the Hantergunje Police Station in the Hazaribag District, where several images of the Tirthankaras are found. Sri A. K. Jha referred to some Jain temples and an image of Adinatha of about the 4th century A. D. Dr. S. R. Das said that he visited many old Jain temples with the icons of Tirthankaras in the interior of the Singhbhum-Manbhum region.
Sri R. K. Bhattacharya read a note on 'the Earliest Form of Jainism'. He did not accept the view that Jainism originated with Pārsvanatha, who died 250 years before the death of Vardhamana Mahavira, because the Jain religious texts show that 22 other prophets flourished before Pär svanatha one after another, having a considerable period of gap between any two of them. He referred to Rṣahha and his ancestors mentioned in the Bhagavata Purana. Prof. Sircar regarded the earlier 22 Jain Tirthankaras as mythical personages and did not attach any importance to the mediaeval Bhagavata Purāṇa legend of Rsabha represented there as an incarnation of Viṣṇu. Prof. D. C. Sircar next read his note entitled 'A Jain Tradition' in which he discussed the Neminahacariu reference to the coins of Calukya Mularāja. Prof. Sircar drew attention to the gold coins bearing the figure of goddess Laksmi and issued by Mularāja as referred to in the colophon of Haribhadra's Nemināhacariu composed in the year 1159 A. D. He said that this Mülarāja must be Mülarāja I of the Calukya or Solanki dynasty of Gujarat who ruled in 961-96 A. D. because Mülaraja II of the same family reigned in 1176-78 A. D., i.e. sometime after the composition of the Nemināhacariu. Prof. Sircar regarded the said tradition recorded about a century and a half after the death of Mularāja I as genuine, because in ancient and mediaeval, India, coins, once in the market, remained in circulation for centuries. He considered it possible that Haribhadra saw some such coins. As regards the absence of any coin bearing the name of Mülarāja, Prof. Sircar suggested that they may have been issued either without the king's name or in a small quantity. Dr. A. M. Shastri agreed
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