Mysore and Coorg from the Inscriptions c14.3

c14.3

Jainism prevailed in Mysore from before the third century B.C., when Bhadrabāhu, accompanied by Chandra Gupta, led a migration of Jains from the North to the South (SB 1), and it continued a popular faith during more than a thousand years of the Christian era. Aśōka, the grandson of Chandra Gupta, strove towards the close of his reign to propagate Buddhism (Mk 21), and in the fourth century A.D. a Bāna king is compared with Bōdhisattva in compassion for all living things in the world (Mb 157). Even so late as 1055 a Buddhist vihāra was erected in Belgāmi (Sk 170), and the Bauddha sāvāsi is mentioned in 1098 (Sk 106), while a great Bauddha town named Kalavati is mentioned even in 1533 (Tp 1). But Buddhists it would seem were never numerous. The spread of Jainism was greatly promoted in the second century A.D. by Samantabhadra (SB 54), and later by Akalanka, who defeated the Buddhists in public disputation at Kāñchi in the eighth or ninth century (SB 54), in consequence of which they were banished to Ceylon. Jainism was the State creed in the time of the Gangas, of some of the Rāshṭrakūṭas and Kalachuryas, and of the early Hoysalas. Also of the minor states of Punnāṭa, of the Śāntaras, the early Changālvas and the Kongālvas, as testified by their inscriptions. But the Chōla conquests in 1004, the conversion of the Hoysala king in 1117, and the assassination of the Kalachurya king in 1167 were severe blows to its influence. In an endeavour to accommodate itself to the age, Jina is described in 1151 as the Universal Spirit who is Śiva, Dhātṛi (Brahmā), Sugata (Buddha), and Vishnu (Tm 9); and for a generation following we find (Ck 21, 13) chieftains who were supporters of all the four creeds,—Māhēśvara, Jaina, Vaishnava, and Bauddha.