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History and Doctrines of the Ajivikas: A Vanished Indian Religion c16.s1: Mahāpadma

History and Doctrines of the Ājīvikas: A Vanished Indian Religion c16.s1

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Mahāpadma

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After the death of Gosāla, Mahāvīra is said to have prophesied his future births.¹ He forecast that the false prophet would ascend to the *Accua-kappa* heaven, and would there enjoy divinity for twelve *sāgarovamāim* periods. Then he would be reborn on earth as Mahāpaüma, the son of King Sammuti and his queen Bhaddā, in the city of Sayaduvāra in the land of the Paṇḍas, which is situated at the foot of the Vindhyas in Bhāratavarṣa. On his accession the two *devas* Puṇṇabhadda and Māṇibhadda would serve as his generals (*seṇā-kammam kāhinti*), and he would ride through the city on a white elephant; hence he would obtain the titles Devaseṇa and Vimalavāhaṇa. He would become a violent persecutor of Jainas until, one day insulting the ascetic Sumaṅgala while the latter was engaged in meditation, he would be reduced by the magic power of the saint's asceticism to a heap of ashes.

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¹ Bh. Sū. xv, fol. 687 ff.

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The soul of Gosāla would then, according to Mahāvīra, continue to transmigrate through many births of all types, until at last the harvest of his evil deeds would be fully reaped, and he would become a Jaina ascetic Daḍhapaïnna in Mahāvideha. Remembering all his past lives he would die by slow starvation in the orthodox manner, and would thus make an end of all sorrow.²

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² Bh. Sū. xv, sū. 560, fol. 694.

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Although Dr. Barua has tried to make a historical figure of Daḍhapaïnna,³ the later rebirths as described in the *Bhagavatī* seem to be of no value for the reconstruction of the story of the Ājīvikas. But it is possible that some significance is to be found in the account of Mahāpaüma, which seems to contain a veiled attack on a king who was a patron of the Ājīvikas and an opponent of the Jainas. If the king in question is not concealed by a false name the only historical figure whom the sovereign described in the *Bhagavatī* can represent is Mahāpadma Nanda. This conclusion has been tentatively accepted by Barua.¹

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³ “. . . Daḍhapaïnna, a wealthy citizen of the great Videha country, sought to bring about a reconciliation between the hostile sects by conferring with the Jainas” (JDL. ii, p. 54). “The Bhagavatī Sūtra refers to an Ājīviya committing religious suicide sometime after Gosāla's death” (ibid., p. 71). Barua backs both these statements by references not to the Sūtra but to Hoernle's paraphrase of its relevant chapter (Uv. Das., vol. ii, app. i). Both the

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¹ *JDL.* ii, p. 67.

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The inference rests on very slight evidence. The great city of Sayaduvāra, with its hundred gates, suggests Pāṭaliputra; the inference that the author had Pāṭaliputra in mind is slightly strengthened by the alternative reading of the text, as used by Hoernle,² which locates the city in the land of the Puṇḍas, and beneath the Vaitāḍhya mountain.³ The latter is a mountain of Jaina legendary geography which defies location, but which may represent the Himālayas. Puṇḍra, or Northern Bengal, was not far distant from Magadha and probably formed part of the Nanda dominions. The power and splendour of the Nanda are attested by various sources,⁴ and in this respect also he resembles the Mahāpaüma of the *Bhagavatī*. The *Purāṇas* suggest that he was by no means orthodox.⁵ Although the titles Devasena and Vimalavāhana are not elsewhere attributed to him he is referred to in the *Mahābodhi-vaṃsa* as Ugrasena.⁶ Two kings named Devasena are mentioned in the legends of the *Kathā-sarit-sāgara*. Of these the first rules at Śrāvastī, and has nothing in common with Mahāpaüma of the *Bhagavatī*,⁷ but the second has some points of similarity.⁸ He rules in Puṇḍravardhana, thus agreeing with the Mahāpaüma of Hoernle's text of the *Bhagavatī Sūtra*. He compels brāhmaṇas and kṣattriyas

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² *Uv. Das.*, vol. ii, app. i, p. 11.

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³ The same forms occur in the *Sthānāṅga Sūtra* (ix, sū. 693, fol. 458), in the description of the capital of the great king Mahāpaüma, who will become the [^cont]: *ni* age.

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⁴ *va-kṣattr*-*antako nṛpaḥ*.

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⁵ 1-1.

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original and the paraphrase make it clear that Daḍhapaïnna is a Jaina ascetic of the normal type, who, by virtue of his spiritual perfection, remembers his past births and informs his disciples of his earlier birth as Gosāla. Barua's conclusion is quite unjustified.

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to pass the night with his daughter, who is possessed by a rākṣasa, and thus encompasses their death; this suggests the traditional antipathy of the historical Mahāpadma to the two higher castes. Finally he is reported to have said: "It is impossible to bar the course of fate, whose dispensations are wonderful."¹ We have here a further legend of a cruel king of Eastern India with a fatalist philosophy, but the link with the historical Mahāpadma is still very tenuous.

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¹ *Gatiḥ śakyā paricchetum na hy adbhuta-vidher vidheḥ*. Ibid. iii, 18, v. 267, p. 269.

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Evidence almost as strong can be found to suggest that the Mahāpaüma of the *Bhagavatī Sūtra* has no historical significance. No reference can be found to show that Mahāpadma’s father was named Sammuti, for which name Hoernle quotes the variant Sumati; the *Purāṇas* declare him to have been a baseborn son of his predecessor Mahānandin.² The only Nanda name which bears the faintest similarity to that of Mahāpaüma’s father is that of the eldest of Mahāpadma’s eight sons, called in the *Bhāgavata Purāṇa* Sumālya³; it is remotely possible that Sammuti is a corruption of this.

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² E.g. *Bhāgavata Purāṇa*, 12, 1, 8.

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³ Ibid., 12, 1, 11. PHAI., p. 190, n. 1.

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Doubts as to the historicity of the Mahāpaüma of the *Bhagavatī* are strengthened by the fact that there are several other figures of the same name and similar description in Jaina mythology.⁴ The first *tīrthaṅkara* of the coming *Utsarpiṇī* will also be named Mahāpaüma, a reincarnation of the Magadhan king "Seṇiya Bhimbhisāra", will be a prince of the same titles, kingdom, and parentage, and will only differ from the reincarnation of Gosāla in his later career. Other Mahāpaümas are the ninth *cakravartī* of the coming *Utsarpiṇī*, and the ninth of the current *Avasarpiṇī*. Furthermore, Jaina tradition, unlike that of the *Purāṇas*, is generally favourable to the Nandas; Hemacandra’s *Pariśiṣṭaparvan*⁵ praises an unnamed Nanda king and repeats several favourable legends about him, none of which suggests that he was an enemy of Jainism.

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⁴ *Ibid.*

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⁵ *Ibid.*

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Indeed it has even been suggested that Mahāpadma was himself a Jaina.⁶ Arguments for this theory are based on the favourable tone of the Jaina legends about him, and on the Hāthīgumphā inscription of Khāravela, which, according to one reading, records that Khāravela restored to Kaliṅga a statue of a Jina, taken by the Nanda.¹ The argument is not conclusive. If Mahāpadma had been an earnest Jaina it is unlikely that he would have outraged the Kaliṅgan Jaina community by robbing their temples of their ikons. It would seem more probable that he carried away the image as a trophy, obtained by harrying a sect to which he was opposed. The inscription is in very bad condition and the reading may be incorrect. Dr. Barua has suggested *janam* for *jinam*,² and the acceptance of this reading would seriously weaken the theory that Mahāpadma was a supporter of Jainism. Further, the Nanda mentioned in the Hāthīgumphā inscription may not have been Mahāpadma at all, but another Nanda king.

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⁶ *Ibid.*

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¹ *Epi. Ind.* xx, pp. 72 ff. *Nanda-rāja-nītam ca Ka[li]ṅga-jinam sannivesa* . . .

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² *IHQ.* xiv, pp. 261 ff.

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In favour of the view that Mahāpadma was a patron of Ājīvikism it may be argued that the Ājīvika community certainly existed in some strength in Magadha at the time, and received some patronage from the Mauryas, who were the successors of the Nandas. Whatever his sect, Mahāpadma seems to have been no friend of orthodox Hinduism, and it may therefore be inferred that he patronized heretical sects. The reference in the *Bhagavatī Sūtra* suggests that he may have given his special support to the Ājīvika *saṅgha*.

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This view is slightly strengthened by a phrase in the *Mahāvaṃsa Commentary*, which states that the great Cāṇakya, after cursing the last Nanda, escaped from his clutches in the guise of a nude Ājīvika ascetic.³ If any inference is to be derived from this late and unreliable tradition it is that Ājīvikas were numerous in Nanda times and not subject to persecution from the royal officers.

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³ *Vamsattha-ppakāsinī*, vol. i, p. 183.

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