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Appendix XXII
Two Great Contemporaries*
There are quite a few similarities in the lives of Mahāvīra - Vardhamana and Buddha - Siddhartha. Mahāvīra was the senior contemporary. Both were princes by birth. In both cases, it was prophesised that they would either become illustrious monarchs or great saints. Both married. Both had a child each. Siddhartha had a son 'Rahula' by name. Vardhamana had a daughter 'Priyadarśana'. Both had wives of almost similar names. 'Yasodhara' was Siddhartha's wife; 'Yasoda' was Vardhamana's wife. Buddha's childhood name was 'Siddhartha', which was the name of Vardhamana's father.
I am not able to get the names of Buddha's siblings, if he had any, whereas I gather that Vardhamana had an elder brother by name 'Nandivardhana', and a sister 'Sudarśana'. These details about Mahavira are in accordance with the Śvetambara tradition. The other Digambara tradition is of the uncompromising view that Mahavira was a celibate throughout his life.
Both had a strong sense of detachment and revolutionary thought processes right from their early years. Both renounced the world at around thirty years of age. While Siddhartha left his wife and son one night, while they were sleeping, Vardhamāna gave up mundane attachment publicity, and after the death of his parents.
Jaina literature records that Vardhamāna took to ascetic order "at the age of 30, on the auspicious tenth of the dark half of
The New Indian Express, 17 April 2000
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