A Question Almost Every Jain Asks One Day
Sooner or later every Jain child asks the same question at home. If we all follow the same Bhagwan Mahavir, then why are there two different pictures of him in two different temples? Why in one place the Jina stands without any cloth, calm and completely free, and in another place the same Jina is dressed and decorated with ornaments?
The honest answer to this question is not found in argument. It is found in history, and Jain history is unusually well recorded. Our acharyas kept the count of years, of shrut (scriptural knowledge) and of the succession of teachers with a care that very few traditions in the world have matched. When you follow that record backwards, one thing become very clear. The Digambar way of the naked, possessionless muni is not one branch of Jainism among two. It is Jainism itself, in the form it was practised before any division ever happened.
Let us walk through this story slowly and with respect, because it is a story about our own family.
Jain Dharma Is Anadi, It Did Not Begin With Mahavir Swami
A very common mistake, and it is repeated even in school textbooks, is that Jain dharma started around 600 BC with Mahavir Swami. This is completely misleading.
According to the Jain agam, in every utsarpini and avasarpini cycle of time, twenty four Tirthankars appear in Bharat kshetra and twenty four in Airavat kshetra. Countless such cycles have already passed. So the Tirthankar parampara has been flowing from anadi kaal, and it will keep flowing till ananta kaal. In the Dhai Dweep there are five Bharat, five Airavat and one hundred sixty Videh kshetras where Tirthankars keep appearing even at this moment.
Bhagwan Mahavir is not the founder of Jain dharma. He is the twenty fourth and the last Tirthankar of the present avasarpini. Before him twenty three Tirthankars had already come, and the first of them was Bhagwan Rishabhdev, who was born in Ayodhya to Maharaja Nabhiraya at the end of the third kaal, countless years ago. His son Bharat became the first chakravarti samrat of this era and it is from his name that this country is called Bharatvarsh.
So when anybody asks what came first in Jainism, the correct answer is that Jain dharma itself is beginningless. What we are actually discussing is something much later and much smaller, which is, when did the two sects appear inside this beginningless dharma.
The Unbroken Line After Bhagwan Mahavir
Mahavir Swami was born in 599 BC and attained moksha in 527 BC. After him the shrut, the direct knowledge of the twelve angas, continued in an unbroken line for six hundred eighty three years. The Digambar tradition preserves this succession in exact numbers, and these numbers are worth reading slowly.
Three Anubaddha Kevalis: Gautam Swami, Sudharma Swami and Jambu Swami, covering sixty two years, from 527 BC to 465 BC.
Five Shrutakevalis: Vishnukumar, Nandimitra, Aparajit, Govardhan and Bhadrabahu, who knew the entire dwadashang shrut, covering one hundred years, from 465 BC to 365 BC.
Eleven Acharyas holding eleven angas and ten purvas: Vishakhacharya, Proshthilacharya, Kshatriya, Jaysen, Nagsen, Siddharth, Dhritishen, Vijay, Buddhiling, Gangdev and Dharmasen, covering one hundred eighty three years, from 365 BC to 182 BC.
Five Acharyas holding eleven angas: Nakshatra, Jaypal, Pandu, Dhruvsen and Kansacharya, covering two hundred twenty years, from 182 BC to 38 AD.
Four Acharangadharis: Subhadracharya, Yashobhadra, Yashobahu and Lohacharya, covering one hundred eighteen years, from 38 AD to 156 AD.
Notice one thing here. During all these centuries nothing was written down. The whole of Jain shrut was carried in the memory of munis who lived without clothes, without vessels, without any possession at all. That is the sangh in which our scriptures survived.
Later, when Acharya Dharsen saw that the memory of the munis was becoming weak and the shrut may be lost forever, he called two capable sadhus from a muni sammelan being held at Mahimanagar in Maharashtra. He tested them, taught them, and they became famous as Pushpadant and Bhutbali. Together they composed the great siddhant granth Shatkhandagam, and in 156 AD, on Jyeshtha Shukla Panchami, the chaturvidh sangh and the devas worshipped it. That is why this tithi is celebrated even today as Shrut Panchami.
Every Jain, Digambar and Shwetambar both, accepts Shrut Panchami. It is useful to remember whose parampara produced that day.
The Twelve Year Famine: Where the Split Actually Began
Now we come to the exact point of separation, and here the account is very specific.
Acharya Bhadrabahu was the last Shrutakevali. Through nimitt gyan he came to know that a famine of twelve years is going to fall on the land. To protect the sangh he left Ujjain and travelled towards south India along with his sangh of munis.
But a portion of the sangh did not go. Some sadhus remained back in north India along with Sthulabhadra, who at that time was an upadhyay in Bhadrabahu's own sangh. The famine which lasted for twelve long years, changed their conduct. Under the pressure of local conditions, hunger, and social difficulty, those sadhus started accepting vastra (clothes) and patra (bowls and vessels). One should not judge them too harshly here, the situation was genuinely terrible.
The problem came afterwards. When the famine ended and the munis returned from the south, they explained to these sadhus that clothes and vessels are not permitted in the muni marg, and that they should return to the original conduct. But this group refused to give it up. What had been adopted as an emergency arrangement was now defended as a rule.
That is exactly how the bhed happened in the sadhu sangh. The sadhus who supported vastra and patra came to be called Shwetambar, and those who remained as before, without any cloth, were called Digambar.
The word Digambar was not a new label for a new sect. It was simply the name that had to be given to the older practice, once a newer practice appeared beside it and needed a name of its own.
The Shwetambar sangh was formally established in Vikram Samvat 136, which falls in the second century, and from that point the Jain samaj stood divided into two main sampradayas.
Why This Sequence Matters
Read the order of events once more, because the order is the whole argument.
First there was one sangh of unclothed munis. Then there was a famine. Then a section adopted clothes as a compulsion. Then they refused to give up the compulsion. Then a new sangh was formally founded in Samvat 136.
A tradition that is founded in Samvat 136 cannot be older than the tradition it separated from. Whatever came out of a body is by definition younger than that body. This is not communal bitterness, it is only chronology, and the chronology is preserved by both sides in their own way.
There is also the famous incident at Girnar Parvat. During a debate with the Shwetambar acharyas, Acharya Kundakunda made the stone image of Saraswati herself speak and declare that the Digambar dharma is the ancient one. Acharya Kundakunda, whose acharya kaal is 127 AD to 179 AD, is the supreme name in the Digambar parampara. Born at Kaundakundapur in Karnataka, he took muni diksha at only eleven years of age and became acharya at thirty three. He composed Samayasar, Pravachansar, Niyamsar, Panchastikay, Rayansar, Mulachar, Ashtapahud and other great granths. His position is so high that in the mangal shlok recited daily by Jains, "Mangalam Bhagwan Viro, Mangalam Gautamo Gani, Mangalam Kundakundadyo, Jain Dharmostu Mangalam", his name is taken with reverence immediately after Bhagwan Mahavir and Gautam Swami.
The Main Differences in Belief
Doctrinally the two traditions are not very far apart, and it is important to say that clearly. Both accept ahimsa, anekant, karma siddhant and moksha marg. Still the differences in manyata are real, and most of them trace back to that same question of possession and the body.
1. Ahar and nihar of a Kevali. The Shwetambar tradition holds that a Kevali still takes food and has bodily functions. The Digambar tradition holds that in that supreme state there is no ahar and no nihar at all.
2. Mukti of one who keeps clothes. Shwetambar say that a person wearing vastra can also attain mukti. Digambar say that liberation comes only in the fully Digambar, possessionless state.
3. Mukti of a woman in that same birth. Shwetambar accept stri mukti. Digambar do not, and this is one of the most discussed difference between the two.
4. Upkarans of a sadhu. A Shwetambar sadhu keeps fourteen upkarans including clothes and vessels. A Digambar muni keeps only three, the pichhi, the kamandalu and the shastra.
5. Tirthankar Mallinath. Shwetambar believe Mallinath was a woman. Digambar believe Mallinath was a man, as every Tirthankar of this era was.
6. Marriage of Bhagwan Mahavir. Shwetambar hold that Mahavir Swami was married. Digambar hold that he was never married.
7. Manner of taking ahar. A Shwetambar sadhu collects bhiksha from many houses. A Digambar muni takes ahar standing, in one house only, and only when his vidhi or pratigya is met, otherwise he returns without food.
8. Form of the pratima. Shwetambar images are shown with clothes and ornaments. Digambar images are fully unclothed, exactly as the vitrag state is.
9. Dreams of the Tirthankar's mother. Shwetambar count fourteen auspicious dreams. Digambar count sixteen.
10. Number of heavens. Shwetambar accept twelve swargas, Digambar accept sixteen.
11. Number of Indras. Shwetambar say there are sixty four Indras. Digambar say there are one hundred.
12. Upsarg upon a Kevali. Shwetambar accept that a Kevali may face upsarg. Digambar say that after Kevalgyan no upsarg is possible.
13. Travel beyond Manushottar Parvat. Shwetambar hold that a human being can go beyond Manushottar Parvat. Digambar hold that he cannot.
Look at the pattern above. Almost every Shwetambar position is a relaxation of a stricter earlier rule, and almost every Digambar position is the harder, less convenient one. Traditions normally become softer with time, they do not become harder. A community does not wake up one morning and decide that from today mukti is more difficult and monks must own less. The direction of change tells you which side is the original.
The Idols Tell the Same Story
There is one more evidence which does not depend on any book, and that is the ancient pratimas themselves. Go to the oldest Jain sites of this country and look at what the murti is wearing. The answer, again and again, is nothing. Ornaments, eyes of glass, silver crowns and cloth are later additions, and in many kshetras these were added on top of images that were originally carved fully Digambar. Anyone who has seen an old image after the decoration is removed knows this feeling very well.
Stone does not argue and stone does not take sides. It only records what the people who carved it believed.
In Conclusion
Jain dharma is anadi and ananta, it was never founded by any one person. In our present avasarpini it was revealed by Bhagwan Rishabhdev and carried forward till Bhagwan Mahavir, and after him it was preserved by kevalis, shrutakevalis and acharyas who owned nothing at all. A twelve year famine created a practical exception, the exception hardened into a habit, the habit was defended as a doctrine, and in Vikram Samvat 136 that doctrine became the Shwetambar panth.
None of this is a reason for any Jain to look down on another Jain. We bow to the same twenty four Tirthankars and we recite the same Namokar Mantra, in which there is not a single word of any sect. But knowing our history correctly is also a kind of ahimsa, because a wrong history quietly does violence to those who preserved the right one at great cost.
The Digambar marg is not the other sect of Jainism. It is Jainism before there were sects.
Frequently Asked Questions
Q. Which sect of Jainism came first, Digambar or Shwetambar? The Digambar tradition is the original one. It is the practice that existed in the sangh of Bhagwan Mahavir and continued unbroken after him. The Shwetambar sangh was established later, in Vikram Samvat 136, after a section of munis adopted clothes and vessels during a twelve year famine and then refused to return to the earlier conduct.
Q. Did Bhagwan Mahavir start Jainism? No. Bhagwan Mahavir is the twenty fourth and last Tirthankar of the present avasarpini. The first Tirthankar was Bhagwan Rishabhdev, and Jain dharma itself is anadi, without beginning.
Q. Who was Acharya Bhadrabahu? He was the last Shrutakevali, the last acharya who knew the complete twelve angas. He foresaw the twelve year famine and moved south with his sangh, and it was the group left behind in the north that later became the Shwetambar panth.
Q. When did the Shwetambar sect start? The Shwetambar sangh was formally established in Vikram Samvat 136, in the second century, when the Jain samaj divided into two main sampradayas.
Q. What is the main difference between Digambar and Shwetambar munis? A Digambar muni keeps only three upkarans, the pichhi, the kamandalu and the shastra, and wears no clothes at all. A Shwetambar sadhu wears white cloth and keeps fourteen upkarans.
Q. Why are Digambar idols without clothes and ornaments? Because a Tirthankar in the state of vitragata has no possession and no attachment of any kind. The unclothed image represents that state exactly. Ornamentation of images is a later development.
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