History and Doctrines of the Ajivikas: A Vanished Indian Religion c14.s1.40

c14.s1.40

We must also disagree with Dr. Barua’s first statement, which implies that the Ājīvikas derived from the forest hermits. Whatever the status of the mysterious predecessors of Makkhali Gosāla, the first Ājīvika of whom the Buddhist scriptures bear record, Upaka, is not a hermit with a settled āśrama in the forest, but a mendicant, wandering from place to place. We believe also that Barua is mistaken in suggesting that the vānaprasthas were an order, in the sense of a body of ascetics with an organized system of practice and doctrine. Rather we believe that the terms vānaprastha and vaikhānasa were approximately synonymous and of broad connotation, both implying a forest hermit of the third *āśrama*; the diversity of the doctrines and disciplines of these hermits is clear from the *Upaniṣads* and from the Pāli scriptures.