History and Doctrines of the Ajivikas: A Vanished Indian Religion c23.s5.24

c23.s5.24

Our picture is by no means complete, but it shows that the Ājīvika *nirvāṇa* differed from that conceived by more orthodox sects. The supreme state of bliss did not entirely transcend the affairs of the world, and was still subject to *Niyati*. It was in fact little different from the other sects' conception of the highest heaven. This fact may throw light on the surprising statement of Śīlāṅka, who, writing surely with full knowledge of the Jaina attacks on Ājīvika antinomianism and immorality, states in his commentary to the *Sūtrakṛtāṅga* that the followers of Gosāla are called Vainayikas ¹; these, he declares elsewhere, desire the attainment of salvation in heaven, from good conduct alone.² The phrase *svarga-mokṣa* perhaps indicates that the Jaina looked on the Ājīvika *nirvāṇa* as comparable to his own heaven. It will be remembered that both the *Aupapātika Sūtra* and the Jaina commentator Mādhavacandra promise the Ājīvika ascetic an abode in the highest Jaina heaven of Acyuta-kalpa.³ This seems to indicate that the Jaina metaphysicians believed that the state which the Ājīvikas fondly imagined to be the highest was actually a lower and less rarefied paradise. The same view appears to have been held by Buddhaghosa, who states that *brāhmaṇas*, *tāpasas*, *paribbājakas*, and Ājīvikas held the heavens of Brahma-loka, Abhassarā, Subhakiṇhā, and Anantamānasa respectively to be the highest state (*niṭṭhā*). Buddhaghosa adds that all these ascetics believed to be complete emancipation what in fact was only arahat-ship.⁴