The Jaina declare that they do not worship their gods, but that they regard them as instruments for working out the fruits of karma. They say also that their gods differ from the members of the Hindu pantheon in being graded: indeed they might almost be considered as having caste amongst themselves. In spite of being gods, they are inferior to men, since before they can attain mokṣa they must be born again as human beings; yet, if they have accumulated good karma in previous births, they may now be enjoying greater bliss than men.
Gods in
Hell.The lowest gods are in Hell, where their work is to torment jīva; these deities are divided into fifteen classes according to their different functions. Amongst them are the Amba, whose special task it is to destroy the nerves of their victims (as a mango is pinched and crushed in a man's hand to soften it, so do they wreck the nerves of the jīva they torture); the Ambarasa, who separate bones and flesh; the Śāma, who beat and belabour men; the Sabala, who tear the flesh; the Rudra, engaged in striking men with spears; the Mahārudra, occupied in chopping flesh into mince-meat; the Kāla, who are roasting the flesh of their victims; the Mahākāla, who are tearing it with pincers; the Asipata, engaged in cutting their victims with swords; the Dhanu, who are shooting them with arrows; the Kumbha, who are indulging in the pastime, so often employed in Indian native states, of torturing with chillies; the Vālu, who steep men in hot sand; the Vetaraṇī, who like devilish dhobīs dash their victims against stones in streams of boiling water; the Kharasvara, who force men to sit on thorny trees; and last in the fearsome list, the Mahāghoṣa, who shut men up in black holes.
Gods in
Pātāla.On the same level as Hell, but in a different direction, is Pātāla; there are, however, no human beings in Pātāla, and so the gods who dwell there are not torturers as they are in Hell. They are divided into two main classes, Bhavanapati and Vyantara. These are again subdivided, there being ten kinds of Bhavanapati: first, the dark god Asura Kumāra, whose body is all black, who loves to wear red garments, and in whose crown is a great crescent-shaped jewel; then Nāga Kumāra, whose body is white, whose favourite garments are green, and in whose crown is a serpent's hood for a symbol; the body of Suvarṇa Kumāra is as yellow as gold, his clothes are white, and his symbol is an eagle; Vidyut Kumāra is red in body, he wears green vestments, and has a thunderbolt in his crown; the body of Agni Kumāra is also red, but his dress is green, and his symbol is a jug; the next god, Dvīpa Kumāra, is red, with green clothes, but has a lion for his sign; Udadhi Kumāra is a white god with green clothes, whose symbol is a horse; an elephant is the sign of the red Diśā Kumāra, who is clad in white; the god Vāyu Kumāra has a green body and wears clothes as red as the sunset sky, and his token is the crocodile; and the last of the ten Bhavanapati is Sthanita Kumāra, with a body as yellow as gold, white clothes, and a shallow earthen pot as his symbol.
The other denizens of Pātāla, the Vyantara, are demons of various classes, and all have trees as their trade-marks. Piśāċa are black-bodied, and have a Kadamba tree as a symbol; Bhūta, whose sign is the Sulasa tree, are also blackbodied; so are Yakṣa, who possess the Banyan tree as their sign; Rākṣasa are white and have the Khaṭamba tree; the green Kinnara have the Aśoka tree; the white Kimpuruṣa the Ċampaka tree; the Nāga or snake tree is the symbol of the black-bodied Mahoraga; and the last of the Vyantara demons, the black Gāndharva, have the Ṭīmbara tree for their sign.
Besides these there are lower demons called Vāṇavyantara, who are named respectively Āṇapannī, Pāṇapannī, Isīvāyī, Bhūtavāyī, Kandīye, Mahākandīye, Kohaṇḍa and Pahaṅga. All these live in the lower regions.
Gods in
Svarga.Then there are the gods of the upper regions. In Svarga there are two classes of gods, Jyotiṣī and Vimānavāsī.
Jyotiṣī gods inhabit Sūrya (the sun), Ċandra (the moon), Graha (the planets), Tārā (the stars) and Nakṣatra (the constellations). The Jaina believe that there is a sun that moves and another that stands still, and that the same is the case with the moon, planets and stars, and that each of these has its own gods.
The class of Vimānavāsī has three divisions: first, the gods of Devaloka (Sudharmā, Īśāna, Sanatkumāra, Māhendra, Brahma, Lāntaka, Mahāśukra, Sahasāra, Āṇata, Prāṇata, Āraṇa and Aċuya); then the gods in Graiveyika who rule over Bhadde, Subhadde, Sujāe, Sumāṇase, Priyadaṁsaṇe, Sudaṁsaṇe, Āmohe, Supaḍībhadde and Jasodhare; and lastly in Anuttaravimāna there are five places, each with a god called Indra to rule over it, viz.: Vijaya, Vijayanta, Jayanta, Aparājita and Sarvārthasiddha.
As on earth (or rather as in India) there are sweepers who act as scavengers for men and live apart from them, so in the heavens there are gods who do menial service for the other gods and live apart from them. The name of these gods is Kilviṣiyā, and they are practically the out-caste or sweeper gods. There are three divisions of them: those who live beneath the first and second Devaloka, those who live below the third, and those who dwell under the seventh; a little higher in the social scale come the servant gods—the Tiryak jāmbṛik—who each live in a separate mountain in a different continent; and above these again are the Lokāntika gods, who are higher servants, and who live in the fifth Devaloka. Altogether there are in heaven and hell ninety-nine kinds of gods who are regarded as menial because they serve.
Could anything show more clearly the terrible way in which caste has fettered not only the lives and customs of the Jaina but even their imagination, than this fact that the very gods who serve are regarded as polluted and contaminated by that service? It is this belief that hinders Jaina from taking their share in the social uplift of India; and it is only the revelation of a Son of God who was amongst us as one that serveth that can set them free.
Over all the Devaloka there is a place called Siddhaśīlā, in which the Siddha live.
All the gods are in a state of happiness, eating, drinking and singing; the good gods (Samakitī) make a point of being present and listening whenever the Tīrthaṅkara preach, but the false gods (Mithyātvī) do not attend. Even the Samakitī will have to be born as men before they can attain mokṣa, but they will soon arrive there, whereas the Mithyātvī will have to undergo numberless rebirths.
Indra is the supreme god, ruling over all the gods, and his commands they must all obey.
The Jaina illustrate their ideas of heaven and hell by the diagram of a man's figure. The legs of the figure, they say, represent Adholoka, wherein are situated the seven hells or Naraka. Ratna Prabhā, the first hell, is paved with sharp stones; Śarkara Prabhā, the second, with pointed stones of sugar-loaf shape; Vālu Prabhā with sand; Paṅka Prabhā with mud; Dhumra Prabhā is filled with smoke; Tama Prabhā is dark enough; but Tamatama Prabhā is filled with thick darkness. The hideous torments inflicted in these terrible hells by the evil gods we have already studied, but in all these hells the jīva have the hope that they will eventually escape from thence when their karma is exhausted. A Śvetāmbara sādhu, however, told the writer of a still worse place, Nigoḍa, situated below the feet of the figure in our diagram, in which are thrown evil jīva who have committed specially heinous sins like murder, and who have no hope of ever coming out. They suffer excruciating tortures, such as having millions of red-hot needles thrust into them, and know that their pain is unending. So many jīva are condemned to Nigoḍa that there is an endless procession of them passing thither like a long, long train of black ants, of which we can see neither the end nor the beginning.
To return to our diagram, the waist of the figure is our world, Tiryakloka, which is made up of two-and-a-half islands, each containing a secret district called Mahāvideha, whose inhabitants alone can attain mokṣa; above comes Svarga or Urdhvaloka, where the gods of the upper world live; the breast of the figure represents Devaloka; the neck Graiveyika; and the face Anuttaravimāna, all of whose gods we have studied; while the crown of the figure is Mokṣa, where dwell those jīva who, after being born as men, have at length attained deliverance.
In common with so many oriental faiths the Jaina think of time as a wheel which rotates ceaselessly downwards and upwards—the falling of the wheel being known as Avasarpiṇī and the rising as Utsarpiṇī. The former is under the influence of a bad serpent, and the latter of a good one.
Avasar-
piṇī. Avasarpiṇī, the era in which we are now living, began with a period known as Suṣama Suṣama, the happiest time of all, which lasted for four crores of crores of sāgaropama,[1] and when every man's height was six miles, and the number of his ribs two hundred and fifty-six.
The children born in this happy period were always twins, a boy and a girl, and ten Kalpavṛikṣa (desire-fulfilling trees) supplied all their need; for one tree gave them sweet fruits, another bore leaves that formed pots and pans, the leaves of a third murmured sweet music, a fourth gave bright light even at night, a fifth shed radiance like little lamps, the flowers of a sixth were exquisite in form and scent, the seventh bore food which was perfect both to sight and taste, the leaves of the eighth served as jewellery, the ninth was like a many-storied palace to live in, and the bark of the tenth provided beautiful clothes. (In many of the Jaina temples representations of the happy twins are carved, standing beneath these desire-fulfilling trees.) The parents of the children died as soon as the twins were forty-nine days old, but that did not so much matter, since the children on the fourth day after their birth had been able to eat as much food as was equal to a grain of corn in size, and they never increased the size of this meal, which they only ate every fourth day. The children never committed the sin of killing, for during their whole lives they never saw a cooking-vessel or touched cooked food, and on their deaths they passed straight to Devaloka, without ever having heard of religion.
In the next period, Suṣama, which, as its name indicates, was only half as happy as the first, the twins born into the world were only four miles high, had only one hundred and twenty-eight ribs, and only lived for two palya of time, but the ten desire-fulfilling trees still continued their kind offices. The parents of the children lived longer now (the Jaina, according to this, would seem not to consider the long life of their parents essential to their own happiness!) and did not die till the children were sixty-four days old; and meanwhile human appetite had so far increased that twins ate a meal equal to a jujube fruit three days after their birth, and continued to do so every third day throughout their lives.
In Suṣama Duṣama the happiness has become mixed with sorrow; the twins are now only two miles in height, have only sixty-four ribs, and live only for one palya, but on their death they still go to Devaloka. It was during this period that Ṛiṣabhadeva, the first Tīrthaṅkara, was born. He taught the twins seventy-two useful arts, such as cooking, sewing, &c.; for he knew that the desire-fulfilling trees would disappear, and that human beings would then have only themselves to depend on. Ṛiṣabhadeva is also credited with having introduced politics and established a kingdom, but his daughter Brāhmī, the Jaina patron of learning, is even more interesting than her father. This learned lady invented eighteen different alphabets (oh, misdirected energy!) including Turkish, Nāgarī, all the Dravidian dialects, Canarese, Persian, and the character used in Orissa. From these, the Jaina say, were derived Gujarātī and Marāṭhī. It is strange that a people who believe the patron of letters to have been a woman should so long have refused to educate their own daughters: surely in this particular they might safely follow the example of so illustrious a being as their first Tīrthaṅkara.
In the period of Duṣama Suṣama, which lasted for one crore of crores of sāgaropama less forty-two thousand years, the height of man was five hundred span, the number of his ribs thirty-two, and his age one crore of purva. The women born in this age ate twenty-eight morsels of food, the men thirty-two, and they both dined once during the day. During this time the Jaina religion was fully developed, and there were born the remaining twenty-three Tīrthaṅkara, eleven Ċakravartī, nine Baḷadeva, nine Vāsudeva, and nine Prativāsudeva. People born during this epoch did not all pass to Devaloka, but might be reborn in any of the four Gati (hell, heaven, man, or beast), or might become Siddha.
Duṣama, the period in which we are now living, is entirely evil. No one can hope to live longer than one hundred and twenty-five years, to have more than sixteen ribs or a greater stature than seven cubits. The era began three years after Mahāvīra reached mokṣa, and will last for twenty-one thousand years. No Tirthaṅkara can be born during Duṣama; nor can any one, lay or ascetic, however good, reach mokṣa without undergoing at least one rebirth (so that there would not seem to be much use in becoming an ascetic nowadays!). Bad as things are now, they must become yet worse, and Jainism itself is doomed to disappear during our present era; the last Jaina monk will be called Duppasahasūri, the last nun Phalguśrī, the last layman Nāgila, and the last laywoman Satyaśrī.
It is this belief that Jainism must disappear that is paralysing so much effort at the present time; for the younger Jaina feel that anything they may do to spread their faith, for instance, is only building castles in the sand that must be swept away by the incoming tide of destruction. It seems, in fact, impossible for any religion which is not illuminated and irradiated by Hope to become a really missionary faith.
Our present era, will be followed by a still more evil one, Duṣama Duṣama, which will also endure for twenty-one thousand years. A man's life will then only last sixteen or, according to some sects, twenty years at most, his height will only be one cubit, and he will never possess more than eight ribs. The days will be hot and the nights cold, disease will be rampant, and chastity, even between brothers and sisters, will be non-existent. At the end of the period terrific tempests will sweep over the earth, and but for the fact that the Jaina know their uncreated world can never be destroyed, they would fear that the earth itself would perish in the storms. Men and birds, beasts and seeds, will seek everywhere for refuge, and find it in the river Ganges, in caves and in the ocean.
Utsar-
piṇī.At last during Duṣama Duṣama, in some month of Śrāvana, and in the dark half of it, the era of Utsarpiṇī will begin, and the wheel of time start its upward revolution. It will rain for seven days seven different kinds of rain, and this will so nourish the ground that the seeds will grow. Duṣama will bring slight improvement.
In Duṣama Suṣama the first of the new twenty-four Tīrthaṅkara will come.
The
twenty-
four
coming
Tīrthaṅ-
kara.The name of this first Tīrthaṅkara will be Padmanābha. In Mahāvīra's time this Padmanābha was a king in Magadha, and at present he is expiating his bad karma in the first hell. When in the upward revolution of the wheel Suṣama has been reached, the other twenty-three coming Tīrthaṅkara will be born.
Supārśva, the uncle of Mahāvīra, who at the present moment is in the second Devaloka, will be the second Tīrthaṅkara, and will be known as Suradeva.
The third will be Udāījī, who was the son of Kuṇika and so grandson of King Śreṇika; he is at present in the third Devaloka, but will be called the Tīrthaṅkara Supārśva.
The fourth, a certain Poṭila, now in the fourth Devaloka, will rule as Svayamprabhu.
Dṛiḍhaketu, the uncle of the husband of Mallinātha (the only woman Tīrthaṅkara), now in the second Devaloka, will be the fifth Tīrthaṅkara, Sarvānubhūti.
Kārttikaśeṭha, the father of the most famous of all Jaina laymen, Ānanda, who is at present in the first Devaloka, will be the sixth, Devaśruta.
Śaṅkhaśrāvaka, a man in the twelfth Devaloka, will be reborn as the seventh coming Tīrthaṅkara, Udayaprabhu.
The eighth will be Ānandaśrāvaka, now in the first Devaloka, who is to be called Peḍhāla.
Sunandāśrāvikā, in the first Devaloka, is to be reborn as the ninth Tīrthaṅkara, Poṭila.
A man called Śatakaśrāvaka, in the third hell, is to be re-incarnate as the tenth, Śatakīrti.
The eleventh is more interesting, for it is Devakī, the mother of Kṛiṣṇa, at present working out her karma in the eighth Devaloka, who will be incarnate as Munisuvrata.
The dark god Kṛiṣṇa himself, now in the third hell, is to become the twelfth Tīrthaṅkara, Amama.
Harasatyakī, the guru of Rāvaṇa of Hindu mythology, when he leaves the fifth Devaloka, is to be incarnate as the thirteenth Tīrthaṅkara, Nikaṣāya.
Kṛiṣṇa's brother Baḷadeva, now in the sixth Devaloka, will become Niṣpulāka, the fourteenth Tīrthaṅkara.
Sulasā, a man now in the fifth Devaloka, is to be the fifteenth, Nirmama.
We have not even yet come to the end of Hindu influence, for the stepmother of Kṛiṣṇa, Rohiṇi (the mother of Baḷadeva), who is in the second Devaloka, will be incarnate as Ċitragupta, the sixteenth Tīrthaṅkara.
Revatī, a woman now in the twelfth Devaloka, who in her past life was married to Mahāśutaka, a famous Jaina layman, will become Sumādhi, the seventeenth Tīrthaṅkara.
The eighteenth was in her past life Subhala, and later a very chaste woman (if not an actual satī), Magavatī, and is at the present time in the eighth Devaloka, from whence she will issue eventually as Saṁvaranātha.
The Hindu ascetic Dvaipāyana, who set fire to Dvārakā, and is now a god, Agni Kumāra, will at last be incarnate as the nineteenth Tīrthaṅkara, Yaśodhara.
The twentieth shows again the enormous popularity of the Kṛiṣṇa cult and the influence it wields over Jaina as well as Hindu thought, for it is that of Kuṇika, who in his past life was Javakumāra, a relative of Kṛiṣṇa's. At present he is in the twelfth Devaloka, but eventually he will issue forth to be born as Vijaya.
Nārada, who was a layman in the time of Ravana, and who is in the fifth Devaloka, will be the twenty-first Tīrthaṅkara, Mallinātha or Malyadeva.
Ambaḍa, a former ascetic (or, according to other traditions, a famous layman), now in the twelfth Devaloka, will become the twenty-second Tīrthaṅkara as Devajina.
The twenty-third is Amara, now in the ninth Graiveyaka, and will be called Anantavīrya.
The twenty-fourth and last of all the coming Tīrthaṅkara is Svayambuddha, now in the highest of all the Devaloka, who is to be incarnate as Bhadrajina.
The first of the new series of Tīrthaṅkara, Padmanābha, will much resemble Mahavira, and will accomplish as much as he did in spreading the faith. After him each succeeding Tīrthaṅkara will carry on the work, and the world will grow steadily happier, passing through every stage till the happiest of all is reached, when the decline of the wheel must once more begin that leads at last to the destruction of Jainism, and so on in endless succession.
- ↑ Jaina technical words for time:
Samaya, the smallest unit of time. Countless samaya pass whilst one is winking an eye, tearing a rotten piece of cloth, snapping the finger, or whilst the spear of a young man is piercing a lotus leaf.
Āvalikā, the next smallest division of time, is made up of innumerable divisions of samaya.
Then comes Muhūrta, which is composed of 16,777,216 āvalikā and is equivalent to forty-eight minutes of English time.
Ahorātra consists of thirty muhūrta, or a night and a day.
After Ahorātra the Jaina count like Hindus by fortnights, months, and years, till they come to Palya, composed of countless years, and Sāgaropama, which consist of one hundred millions of palya multiplied by one hundred millions.