Studies in South Indian Jainism

Author(s): M S Ramaswami Ayyangar, B Seshagiri Rao
Publisher: M S Ramaswami Ayyangar

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12
EARLY HISTORY.
possessed a fixed tradition. The belief that I am able to insert this missing link in the chain of argument and the hope of removing the doubts of my two honoured friends has caused me to attempt a connected statement of the whole question although this necessitates the repetition of much that has already been said, and is in the first part almost entirely a recapitulation of the results of Jacobi's
researches." Jainism not From the above summary of,the opinions of Buddhism. scholars, it is clear that Jainism wlis not only
distinct and separate from Buddhism, but that it had an earlier existence. If so, what was the position of Mahāvīra ? That he could not have been the founder of the faith is evident. He is therefore to be considered as a reformer of the
Jain faith. . As a matter of fact, the traditions of Mahā
Vīra's own sect speak of him as 'one who from the beginning had followed a religion established long ago. This position is in perfect accord With Jain theology according to which Mahāvīra Vardhamāna is the twenty-fourth and the last Tirthankara, twenty-three "Tirthankaras having preceded him. His imrnediate predecessor was Parsvanāth. He was born in 1877 B.C. and is supposed to have reached Moksha in the hundredth year of his age in 777 B.C. Thus Parsvanāth seems to have better claims to the title of “the founder of Jainis " and only two centuries have intervened between the death of