Pramāṇa · Search · About · API

History and Doctrines of the Ajivikas: A Vanished Indian Religion c12.s2: Gosāla Visits Mahāvīra

History and Doctrines of the Ājīvikas: A Vanished Indian Religion c12.s2

Language
English

Gosāla Visits Mahāvīra

c12.s2.1

After this incident Gosāla, filled with anger, visited Mahāvīra at the Koṭṭhaga caitya, attended as usual by a band of followers. Here he explained that he was not really Gosāla Maṅkhaliputta, the former colleague of Mahāvīra, but Udāī Kuṇḍiyāyaṇīya,¹ and expounded fully his doctrine of transmigration under the control of Niyati.² After this long lecture Mahāvīra replied that Gosāla was like a thief chased by villagers, feverishly trying to hide himself. " It won't do, Gosāla !" he said, " that shadow is your own, and nobody else's !"³

c12.s2.2

¹ V. supra, pp. 30 ff.

c12.s2.3

² Bh. Sū. xv, sū. 550, fols. 673-4. V. infra, pp. 219, 249 ff.

c12.s2.4

³ Tam mā evam Gosālā n' ārihasi . . . Sacc' eva te sā chāyā, no annā. Bh. Sū. xv, sū. 551, fol. 677.

c12.s2.5

Thereupon Gosāla's anger flared into fury, and he roundly cursed Mahāvīra.⁴ This horrified the disciple Savvāṇubhūti, who reproached Gosāla sternly for so reviling his former teacher.⁵ Gosāla promptly turned his anger upon the faithful disciple, and immediately reduced him to a heap of ashes by the magic force which he had accumulated from his asceticism. When a second disciple, Suṇakkhatta, remonstrated with him, he also suffered the same fate, although he survived long enough to pay a final homage to his master Mahāvīra.

c12.s2.6

⁴ Op. cit., sū. 552, fol. 677.

c12.s2.7

⁵ Op. cit., sū. 553, fol. 677.

c12.s2.8

Gosāla once more turned to Mahāvīra and repeated his curses. The latter reproached him in terms the same as those used by his two dead disciples. Gosāla then stepped back and attempted to destroy his adversary by his magic power; but on so perfect an ascetic as Mahāvīra the magic was quite ineffectual. The stream of supernatural force rebounded, and penetrated the body from which it had emanated.

c12.s2.9

Apparently Gosāla was unaware of what had happened. " You are now pervaded by my magic force," he said to Mahāvīra, " and within six months you will die of bilious fever (pittajjara)."

c12.s2.10

Unperturbed, Mahāvīra replied that the magic power of Gosāla had had no effect on him, but that Gosāla himself would die of bilious fever within seven nights, smitten by his own powers. He, Mahāvīra, on the other hand, would live on earth as a jina for another sixteen years.⁶

c12.s2.11

⁶ Bh. Sū. xv, sū. 553, fol. 678.

c12.s2.12

The news of this magic duel spread through the city. The whole populace was aroused to a high pitch of excitement, and the partisans of one or other of the ascetics fiercely maintained their masters' causes.

c12.s2.13

Now Mahāvīra permitted his disciples to approach Gosāla and dispute with him. Already the latter began to feel the effects of the magic power, and his complexion changed its hue. Many of his disciples left him, and went over to Mahāvīra's faction, but a few remained faithful to their old master. Staring about him, tearing his beard, and stamping the ground, Gosāla cried “Alas, I am ruined!”¹ and returned to the potter-woman's workshop.

c12.s2.14

¹ Hā hā aho, haō'ham assi. Op. cit., fol. 679.

c12.s2.15

The circumstantial details of this story give it a measure of credibility. After extracting the supernatural element we have the record of a violent quarrel which took place between Gosāla and Mahāvīra, shortly before the death of the former, in the course of which two followers of the latter lost their lives. This is Hoernle's interpretation of the story.² Barua, on the other hand, suggests that the account of the deaths of the two disciples may be a veiled admission that they betrayed their leader and joined the faction of Gosāla.³ This is by no means impossible, but in view of the explicit statement of the text we prefer the former explanation.

c12.s2.16

² ERE. i, p. 259.

c12.s2.17

³ JDL. ii, pp. 34 ff.

c12.s2.18

It would seem that, prior to this incident, the two teachers had generally tolerated one another, and the followers of the two sects had been often on not unfriendly terms. The quarrel at the Koṭṭhaga caitya apparently changed the situation, and from now on the relations of the Ājīvikas and the Nirgranthas became openly hostile, tempered only by the vows of *ahiṃsā* which the members of the latter sect maintained, as probably did the Ājīvikas also.

Linked texts (1)