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JAINA FESTIVALS
PADAMNABH S. JAINI
Jainism
Jainism today is a religion whose followers are few in number, only about four million throughout India. Along with Buddhism it was one of the two most prominent Shramana or non-Brahmanical religions that originated in the Ganges valley during the sixth or seventh century BCE, but its history differs from that of Buddhism in two striking respects: Buddhism was destined to spread throughout south-east and east Asia, while Jainism never left the subcontinent; secondly, Buddhism declined and almost disappeared from India, while Jainism survives in almost all parts of India, especially in the western states (Punjab, Rajasthan, Gujarat) and the Deccan (Maharashtra and Karnataka).
Jainism is recognisable as an Indian religion, espousing the doctrine of samsara (the cycle of birth and death). This doctrine holds that all living beings are bound by their karma (effect of past deeds), which leads to their successive re-births in different bodies, but that there is a possibility of salvation in the form of freedom from the cycle of birth and death. Nevertheless, it rejects the authority of the Vedas and related texts, the efficacy of sacrifice, the existence of a creator-god, and the underlying rationale of the caste system. The human model emulated by the Jainas is that of the perfected ascetic, whom they call Jina (Victorious), whence the name Jaina is derived, or Tirthankara (Maker of a bridge across the river of samsara).
The Jainas, who hold to a variation of the typically Indian scheme of beginningless, cyclical time, believe that in each of an infinite number of cosmic cycles there is an ascending and descending phase, and in each phase twenty-four Tirthankaras teach the Jaina path. We are currently near the end of the descending phase, the first. teacher of which was named Rishabha, and the last Vardhamana Mahavira. Only legendary accounts of the first twenty-two nas exist, while the twenty-third Jina, Parshva, is considered an
Courtesy: Collection of the Research Papers of Prof. P.S. Jaini
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