Shravakachar of Vasunandini

Author(s): Signe Kirde
Publisher: Signe Kirde

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5.1
The Stage of True Insight
5 TRANSLATION: ŚR (57-205)
vesā The prostitute and the courtesan (Skt. veśyā / ganṇikā) are often described as the embodiment of fickleness in gnomic literature, but in some narrative texts they are the leading female characters. There are examples of their wickedness in Amitagati's Subhāṣita-ratna-samdoha, chapters XXIV and XXXI. We find in Jain manuals also intersections with the transgressions (aticäras) against the vow of chastity for the laity, 158
• pāraddhi In early Jain religious thinking we find the idea of animosity (vaira) in relation to the injury of five-sensed beings. 159 The Skt. term for hunting (Skt. papa-rddhi) is often explained as "evilthriving" in gnomic literature. 160 Outside Jainism there are various and contradictory views with respect to hunting. The authors of the Śastras describe hunting as the royal pasttime per se, as a mental and physical training of the warrior classes. 161 Hunting is reflected with regard to non-injury of life in the Maha-bharata, for example in chapter XVI, in the story of Dasaratha who kills a young man, because he mistakes him for an antelope with the result that a curse is bestowed on him. Of this legend many variants are known such as the account of Pandu who kills a Ṛsi while enjoying hunting (Maha-bhārata I.109). Sometimes, this sport in the wilderness is associated with sexual excitement as referred to in the Maha-bharata 1.36. Generally, in some of the Vedic texts "wilderness" or "forest" are contrasted with "village", and hunting is associated with "wilderness". "The civilisation of the Brāhmaṇas and Aranyakas or 'Forest books' is certainly sedentary but illustrates at the same time that forest continued to be contrasted with village." (Staal 2008:147). The idea of contrasting village and forest life is prevalent in Śr, if we take to account the distinction of "wilderness" / "forest life" (126-127), (195-196), "village life" (83), and "town life" (126-127), (195-196). But, to my point of view, our author maintains that the injury of five-sensed living beings out of carelessness is always a harmful act which effects evil.
• cora Earning one's means of livelihood in honesty is a key element of the "Three Jewels" of Jainism. Thieving, i.e. exploiting others, taking
damda. See also Jaini 1979:231; Bollée 2010a on Rk I.6, V.4.
158,
See Williams 1963:85ff., 131, 250. Outside Jainism there are also various stanzas and stories that describe the virtues and vices of prostitutes. See Kṣemendra's Samaya-mātṛkā (Meyer 1904), the Kala-vilasa of the same author, chapter III, summarised in Meyer 1904, Introduction, p. XLV, and the Deśôpadeśa, chapter III, of the same author (Sternbach 1961:8-19). For examples in Buddhist narrative literature see Kirde 2004:41-65.
159 See my notes on puvva-vera in Śr (170) and Dixit 1973.
160 Cf. MW: p. 618, on hunting; Williams 1963:251 presents the analytical list of the fifteen forbidden trades and harmful activities, which include hunting, selling meat or other substances of non-human and human animals.
161 See for instance Krottenthaler 1996:16ff.
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