Sramana 2016 01

Author(s): Shreeprakash Pandey, Rahulkumar Singh, Omprakash Singh
Publisher: Parshvanath Vidhyashram Varanasi

Page 81

74: Śramaṇa, Vol 67, No. 1, January-March 2016
installed in it stand for the highest peace, devotion and spirituality. The rendering of the Brahmanical deities on Jaina temples at Deogarh, Khajuraho (Pārsvanatha temple), Kumbhāriyā, Delvāḍā (Kṛṣṇa and Kṛṣṇalīlā, Kṛṣṇa playing holi, Narasimha) is indicative of socioreligious interaction and harmony, which could be manifested in art only after an open and broader outlook.
The images of the Jaina Tirthankaras and also those of Bahubali and Bharata (not as cakravartin but as muni only) highlight certain moral, social and religious values, which are essential for becoming a real human being to render the service to humanity to have experience of ānanda. Through the postures (dhyāna and kāyotsargamudras) of Tirthankaras, Bharata muni and Bahubali and their lives and iconographic features, such as upsargas (inflictions) caused to Pārsvanatha and Mahāvīra during their meditation, strict adherence to ahimsa by 16th Tirthankara Santinatha, renunciation of Neminatha (due to the imminent slaughter of animals on the occasion of his marriage feast, Fig. 1), entwining creepers, snakes and lizards with Bahubali (Fig. 2) and the objects like nine-jewels (navanidhi) and fourteen-treasures (14 ratnas) associated with Bharata as cakravartin being relinquished by him at the time of dīkṣā (initiation) and his cosequent sadhana as muni, the core idea of moral, social values of truth, non-violence, non-possessiveness or tyāga have been exemplified visually. These forms serve as future social models for humanity. Therefore Jaina art has been the vehicle of social and individual code of conduct, besides their aesthetic and religious value. The 16th Tirthankara Śāntinātha in his previous life as king Megharatha was example of ahimsā and satya (commitment) who was put to test by the god Surupa.2 A falcon was chasing a pigeon. The god Surupa entered into the body of pigeon and flew to come to Megharatha asking to save him from the falcon and was assured of his life by the king. The falcon also came and said to Megharatha that he was extremely hungry and he should be given pigeon to contain his hunger. Megharatha asked to take something else but to leave pigeon. On insistence to have either the pigeon or the