History and Doctrines of the Ajivikas: A Vanished Indian Religion c15.s1.5

c15.s1.5

This passage seems to give a convincing picture of the begging habits of Makkhali Gosāla and his two shadowy predecessors, who are named with him in the text; it might be inferred that it also applies to the community which he established. But its reliability, as applying to the Ājīvika order, is questionable. In another passage of the *Majjhima*¹ the same words are put into the mouth of the Buddha himself, when he describes his own ascetic conduct before his enlightenment. In fact the ascetics here described do not seem to be members of the organized Ājīvika community, despite the inclusion of the name of Makkhali Gosāla; the description of ascetic begging practice applies to the wide class of *acelakas*, or naked ascetics, which class seems to have included not only organized Ājīvikas, but free-lance Ājīvikas and *nirgranthas* or Jainas, as well as independent ascetics and members of the smaller mushroom communities of the time. Some of the practices referred to may have been followed by Makkhali Gosāla’s Ājīvikas, but there is no reason to believe that they followed all of them.