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The Unknown Pilgrims
The mahāvratas, like the avaśyakas, form part of the vinuous and meritorous activities which halt karmic penetration. In the same way as sāmāyika, the mahāvratas pledge one to a state of life, that state that is the starting-point for any progress on the way. They mark the start of the long march towards moksa and herein lies their extreme importance. The Acārānga-sūtra II deals with them in detail, giving them a formal structure which other texts develop, preserving the same basic contents, though with certain variations as regards expression. Together the mahāvratas form a whole, of which ahiṁsā is the foundation-stone, the pillar of samyak-cāritra,8 while each individually rests upon secondary pillars which are called bhāvanās 9
According to vyavahāra, each mahāvrata has a bearing upon certain acts of body, speech and mind, but every act is posterior to some intention, bhāva, interior disposition, orientation of mind or being, and this is niscaya; on occasion the intention may not issue in action. Each mahāvrata contains two aspects: that which one must not do or be (negative aspect) which prompts the opposite act, attitude or intention (positive aspect). To go straight to the heart of each mahāvrata, we refer to each by the word which best expresses the corresponding attitude: ahiṁsā, satya, asteya, brahmacarya, aparigraha.
7 CF. AS II, 15 (i-v); ADH IV, 19-150; IS IV, 11-17; VI, 8-20; MA I, 5-9; V, 92-97; SS 389a; YSas I, 19-24. In these texts the words used to denote each of the mahāvratas vary, although the meaning is the same. The DS and SthS refer to them in this way: prānātipata-mrsavāda-adattádāna-maithunaparigraha-viramaņa. ADh IV, 19 gives: cură for asteya and YSas I, 19; sünşta for satya
8 Cf. YSas I, 18.
9 The word generally means: reflection, consideration, meditation; here it is a question of practical counsels that one must bind oneself to observe, which presupposes some previous reflection on the subject. Certain texts treat, first, each mahāvrata and then its bhāvanās, e.g. the ADh and the AS which we are following: others deal with them separately, e.g. MA V, 140-144; TS VII, 38; YSas 1, 25-33.
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