



Produced by Ben Courtney, Laura Sabel Bauer and PG Distributed
Proofreaders





  Note to the Gutenberg edition: The following system has been used to
  transliterate the unusual, non-Latin 1 diacriticals from the original
  document:

    [A.]  Letter with dot below
    [.A]  Letter with dot above
    [=A]  Letter with macron above
    [.)]  Letter with candrabindu above

       *       *       *       *       *

                        ON
                  THE INDIAN SECT
                        OF
                    THE JAINAS

                        BY
       JOHANN GEORG BUEHLER C.I.E., LLD., PH.D.
 Member of the Imperial Academy of Sciences, Vienna.

            TRANSLATED FROM THE GERMAN.

     EDITED with an OUTLINE of JAINA MYTHOLOGY

                        BY
       JAS. BURGESS, C.I.E., LL.D., F.R.S.E.

                       1903.



                     PREFACE.

       *       *       *       *       *

The late Dr. Georg Buehler's essay _Ueber die Indische Secte der
Jaina_, read at the anniversary meeting of the Imperial Academy of
Sciences of Vienna on the 26th May 1887, has been for some time out of
print in the separate form. Its value as a succinct account of the
['S]ravaka sect, by a scholar conversant with them and their religious
literature is well known to European scholars; but to nearly all educated
natives of India works published in German and other continental languages
are practically sealed books, and thus the fresh information which they
are well able to contribute is not elicited. It is hoped that the
translation of this small work may meet with their acceptance and that of
Europeans in India and elsewhere to whom the original is either unknown or
who do not find a foreign language so easy to read as their own.

The translation has been prepared under my supervision, and with a few
short footnotes. Professor Buehler's long note on the authenticity of the
Jaina tradition I have transferred to an appendix (p. 48) incorporating
with it a summary of what he subsequently expanded in proof of his thesis.

To Colebrooke's account of the Tirtha[.n]karas reverenced by the Jainas,
but little has been added since its publication in the ninth volume of the
_Asiatic Researches_; and as these are the centre of their worship,
always represented in their temples, and surrounded by attendant
figures,--I have ventured to add a somewhat fuller account of them and a
summary of the general mythology of the sect, which may be useful to the
archaeologist and the student of their iconography.

  Edinburgh, April 1903.  J. BURGESS.




CONTENTS.

THE INDIAN SECT OF THE JAINAS, by Dr. J. G. BUEHLER.

Appendix:--Epigraphic testimony to the continuity of the Jaina
tradition

SKETCH OF JAINA MYTHOLOGY, by J. BURGESS.




THE INDIAN SECT OF THE JAINAS.

The _Jaina_ sect is a religious society of modern India, at variance
to Brahmanism, and possesses undoubted claims on the interest of all
friends of Indian history. This claim is based partly on the peculiarities
of their doctrines and customs, which present several resemblances to
those of Buddhism, but, above all, on the fact that it was founded in the
same period as the latter.

Larger and smaller communities of _Jainas_ or _Arhata_,--that is
followers of the prophet, who is generally called simply the
_Jina_--'the conqueror of the world',--or the _Arhat_--'the holy
one',--are to be found in almost every important Indian town, particularly
among the merchant class. In some provinces of the West and North-west, in
Gujarat, Rajputana, and the Panjab, as also in the Dravidian districts in
the south,--especially in Kanara,--they are numerous; and, owing to the
influence of their wealth, they take a prominent place. They do not,
however, present a compact mass, but are divided into two rival
branches--the _Digambara_ and _['S]vetambara_ [Footnote: In notes
on the Jainas, one often finds the view expressed, that the _Digambaras_
belong only to the south, and the _['S]vetambaras_ to the north. This is
by no means the case. The former in the Panjab, in eastern Rajputana and
in the North West Provinces, are just as numerous, if not more so, than
the latter, and also appear here and there in western Rajputana and
Gujarat: see _Indian Antiquary_, vol. VII, p. 28.]--each of which is
split up into several subdivisions. The Digambara, that is, "those whose
robe is the atmosphere," owe their name to the circumstance that they
regard absolute nudity as the indispensable sign of holiness, [Footnote:
