History and Doctrines of the Ajivikas: A Vanished Indian Religion c12.23

c12.23

It is probable that the disācaras were Gosāla’s chief disciples, and that the meeting at Sāvatthi was a conference at which the doctrines of the Ājīvikas were codified and the claims of their leader to omniscience and perfection were explicitly stated. The disācaras may have been wandering evangelists, to whom Makkhali Gosāla had assigned dioceses corresponding to the six quarters (diśā) of early Hinduism and Buddhism.³ On this hypothesis, however, it is not easy to suggest the functions of the disācaras representing the upward and downward directions.