Studies in Buddhist and Jaina Monachism

Author(s): Nand Kishor Prasad
Publisher: Research Institute of Prakrit Jainology & Ahimsa Mujjaffarpur

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STUDIES IN BUDDHIST AND JAINA MONACHISM
(d) Conclusion
- It is almost certain that the uposatha owes, in some form or other a pre-Bramaņic origin. Pt. Shri Sukhlalji Sanghavi also holds the same opinion which is manifest in his following words :
“There is no material before us for determining how one tradition influenced another a thousand years ago. Nevertheless we may venture to observe that the upavasatha (fasting) in the Vedic tradition was considered to be the means of acquisition of a pleasant condition (heaven ?). In the Sramanic tradition on the other hand uposathai or posaha was regarded as the instrument of the good (salvation). Viewed from the course of evolution it is found that the conception of the good (blessed condition) has come about among mankind after that of the pleasant. If this be true, the custom of upavāsa (fast) or posaha in the śramapic tradition, however ancient it may be, must be held to bear the impress of the fasting ceremony of the Vedic cult of sacrifice".2
One point more which may be gathered from this study is that the Buddhist were the last to adopt this practice, firstly, because they admit frankly enough that the ceremony was already in vogue among the titthiyas, and secondly, the Jaina posaha, like the Vedic upavasatha, was a sole concern of the householders rather than of the mendicants as we find in case of the Buddhist. This adherence of the Jainas to the original form takes the Jaina posaha to greater antiquity than the uposatha of the Buddhists who wrought a change in the
riginal form (i. e. from social to monastic), in all probability, to claim a greater antiquity and novelty.
1. The uposat ha ceremony in the Buddhist tradition did not include fasting,
though it might be the original content of it. 2. Darsana Aur Cintana, Vol. II, p. 107.