On the Indian Sect of the Jainas

by Georg Bühler

The Buddhist remarks on the personality and life of Nâtaputta are still more remarkable. They say repeatedly that he laid claim to the dignity of an Arhat and to omniscience which the Jainas also claim for their prophet, whom they prefer simply to call 'the Arhat' and who possesses the universe-embracing 'Kevala' knowledge. [[30]] A history of conversions, tells us further that Nâtaputta and his disciples disdained to cover their bodies; we are told just the same of Vardhamâna. [[31]] A story in the oldest part of the Singalese canon gives an interesting and important instance of his activity in teaching. Buddha, so the legend runs, once came to the town Vaiśâlî, the seat of the Kshatriya of the Lichchhavi race. His name, his law, his community were highly praised by the nobles of the Lichchhavi in the senate-house. Sîha, their general, who was a follower of the Nigantha, became anxious to know the great teacher. He went to his master Nâtaputta, who happened to be staying in Vaiśâlî just then, and asked permission to pay the visit. Twice Nâtaputta refused him. Then Sîha determined to disobey him. He sought Buddha out, heard his teaching and was converted by him. In order to show his attachment to his new teacher he invited Buddha and his disciples to eat with him. On the acceptance of the invitation, Sîha commanded his servants to provide flesh in honour of the occasion. This fact came to the ears of the followers of the Nigantha. Glad to have found an occasion to damage Buddha, they hurried in great numbers through the town, crying out, that Sîha had caused a great ox to be killed for Buddha's entertainment; that Buddha had eaten of the flesh of the animal although he knew it had been killed on his account, and was, therefore guilty of the death of the animal. The accusation was brought to Siha's notice and was declared by him to be a calumny. Buddha, however preached a sermon after the meal, in which he forbade his disciples to partake of the flesh of such animals as had been killed on their account. The legend also corroborates the account in the Jaina works, according to which Vardhamâna often resided in Vaiśâlî and had a strong following in that town. It is probably related to show that his sect was stricter, as regards the eating of flesh, than the Buddhists, a point, which again agrees with the statutes of the Jainas. [[32]]

The account of Nâtaputta's death is still more important. "Thus I heard it", says an old book of the Singalese canon, the Sâmagâma Sutta, "once the Venerable one lived in Sâmagâma in the land of the Sâkya. At that time, however, certainly the Nigantha Nâtaputta had died in Pâvâ. After his death the Nigantha wandered about disunited, separate, quarrelling, fighting, wounding each other with words." [[33]] Here we have complete confirmation of the statement of the Jaina canon as to the place where Vardhamâna entered Nirvân

a, as well as of the statement that a schism occurred immediately after his death.

The harmony between the Buddhist and Jaina tradition, as to the person of the head of the Nirgrantha is meanwhile imperfect. It is disturbed by the description of Nâtaputta as a member of the Brâhmanic sect of the Âgniveśyâyana, whilst Vardhamâna belonged to the Kâśyapa. The point is however so insignificant, that an error on the part of the Buddhists is easily possible. [[34]] It is quite to be understood that perfect exactness is not to be expected among the Buddhists or any other sect in describing the person of a hated enemy. Enmity and scorn, always present, forbid that. The most that one can expect is that the majority and most important of the facts given may agree.

This condition is undoubtedly fulfilled in the case on hand. It cannot, therefore be denied, that, in spite of this difference, in spite also of the absurdity of one article of the creed ascribed to him, Vardhamâna Jñâtiputra, the founder of the Nirgrantha--or Jaina community is none other than Buddha's rival. From Buddhist accounts in their canonical works as well as in other books, it may be seen that this rival was a dangerous and influential one, and that even in Buddha's time his teaching had spread considerably. Their legends about conversions from other sects very often make mention of Nirgrantha sectarians, whom Buddha's teaching or that of his disciples had alienated from their faith. Also they say in their descriptions of other rivals of Buddha, that these, in order to gain esteem, copied the Nirgrantha and went unclothed, or that they were looked upon by the people as Nirgrantha holy ones, because they happened to have lost their clothes. Such expressions would be inexplicable if Vardhamâna's community had not become of great importance. [[35]]

This agrees with several remarks in the Buddhist chronicles, which assert the existence of the Jainas in different districts of India during the first century after Buddha's death. In the memoirs of the Chinese Buddhist and pilgrim Hiuen Tsiang, who visited India in the beginning of the seventh century of our era, is to be found an extract from the ancient annals of Magadha, which proves the existence of the Nirgrantha or Jainas in their original home from a very early time. [[36]] This extract relates to the building of the great monastry at Nâlandâ, the high school of Buddhism in eastern India, which was founded shortly after Buddha's Nirvân

a, and mentions incidentally that a Nirgrantha who was a great astrologer and prophet had prophesied the future success of the new building. At almost as early a period the Mahâvan[g]sa, composed in the fifth century A.D., fixes the appearance of the Nirgrantha in the island of Ceylon. It is said that the king Pandukâbhaya, who ruled in the beginning of the second century after Buddha, from 367-307 B.C. built a temple and a monastery for two Nirgranthas. The monastery is again mentioned in the same work in the account of the reign of a later king Vattâgâmini, cir. 38-10 B.C. It is related that Vattâgâmini being offended by the inhabitants, caused it to be destroyed after it had existed during the reigns of twenty one kings, and erected a Buddhist Sam[postvocalic]

ghârâma in its place. The latter piece of information is found also in the Dîpavan[g]sa of more than a century earlier. [[37]]

None of these works can indeed be looked upon as a truly historical source. There are, even in those paragraphs which treat of the oldest history after Buddha's death, proofs enough that they simply hand down a faulty historical tradition. In spite of this, their statements on the Nirgrantha, cannot be denied a certain weight, because they are closely connected on the one side with the Buddhist canon, and on the other they agree with the indisputable sources of history, which relate to a slightly later period.

The first authentic information on Vardhamâna's sect is given by our oldest inscriptions, the religious edicts of the Maurya king Aśoka, who, according to tradition was anointed in the year 219 after Buddha's death, and--as the reference to his Grecian contemporaries, Antiochos, Magas, Alexander, Ptolemaeus and Antigonas confirms,--ruled, during the second half of the third century B.C. over the whole of India with the exception of the Dekhan. This prince interested himself not only in Buddhism, which he professed in his later years, but he took care, in a fatherly way, as he repeatedly relates, of all other religious sects in his vast kingdom. In the fourteenth year of his reign, he appointed officials, called law-superintendents, whose duty it was to watch over the life of the different communities, to settle their quarrels, to control the distribution of their legacies and pious gifts. He says of them in the second part of the seventh 'pillar' edict, which he issued in the twenty-ninth year of his reign, "My superintendents are occupied with various charitable matters, they are also engaged with all sects of ascetics and householders; I have so arranged that they will also be occupied with the affairs of the Sam[postvocalic]