Article: Dharma

Dates and numbers

The five auspicious events that mark a Jina’s life – kalyāṇakas – are traditionally associated with a specific date. This is given according to the system of the Indian calendar:

• month
• fortnight
• day in the fortnight.

Astrological considerations also play a role here and the texts normally mention the constellations when an auspicious event takes place.

The dates associated with these events are potential or actual dates of commemoration. These may be marked in festivals, which determine the Jain religious calendar.

There may be variations in the dates in different sources, Śvetāmbara on one side, Digambara on the other. But there are also cases of differences within the same sectarian tradition.

There are also other numbers connected with the life of this Jina.

Monastic and lay communities

Sketch of a Jina
Image by British Library © CC0 1.0 (Creative Commons Public Domain)

A Jina is not an enlightened being who exists alone after reaching omniscience. After perfect knowledge comes general preaching – samavasaraṇa. This sermon, which is attended by all, is reported in the scriptures as resulting in large numbers of listeners being inspired. Many turn to religious life, becoming monks or nuns, while many others make the vows that lay people – śrāvaka and śrāvikā – can follow in their everyday lives. Further, the Jina’s teachings are preserved and passed on by his chief disciples – the gaṇadharas. This is why a Jina is also called a Tīrthaṃkara, meaning ‘ford-maker’ or ‘founder of a community’.

Each Jina establishes a ‘fourfold community‘, led by the chief disciples. Made up of monks, nuns, lay men and lay women, the fourfold community follows the principles the Jina has set out in his preaching. How members follow the religious teachings vary according to whether they remain householders or take initiation into mendicancy. Individual figures relating to each Jina are thus important.

Dharma’s fourfold community

Chief disciples	Monks	Nuns	Lay men	Lay women
43 led by Ariṣṭa – Śvetāmbara 35 led by Ariṣṭasena – Digambara	64,000	62,400 – Śvetāmbara 64,000 led by Suvratā – Digambara	240,000	413,000

Identification

All Jinas have individual emblems – lāñchanas – and colours that help to identify them in artwork. They also have attendant deities known as yakṣa and yakṣī, who often appear flanking them in art.

More details

Besides the basic information, the sources provide more details on various topics. These are almost infinite and vary depending on the sources. Such information differs between Śvetāmbaras and Digambaras. Here are only a few instances of extra detail.

All of the princes who become Jinas are carried on a palanquin to the park where they perform the ritual gesture of initiation into monastic life – dīkṣā. The palanquin of Dharmanātha or Lord Dharma is named Nāgadattā. On this occasion, he is accompanied by one thousand kings.

He performs a two-day fast. The next day he breaks his fast at the house of Dharmasiṃha or Dhanyasena, depending on the version.

Dharma wanders for two years as an ordinary ascetic and reaches omniscience under a tree of the dadhiparṇa variety.

Events, stories, hymns

The life of Dharmanātha or Lord Dharma is almost eventless. In the 9th-century Lives of the 54 Jain Great Men – Cauppaṇṇa-mahāpurisa-cariya – written in Prakrit by the Śvetāmbara monk Śīlānka, the chapter about the 15th Jina is hardly more than one page.

The 12th-century Sanskrit text Tri-ṣaṣṭi-śalākā-puruṣa-caritra, written by Hemacandra, has become the standard Śvetāmbara version of the Jinas’ lives. This text gives Dharma’s life more substance because the story of the triad of Sudarśana, Puruṣasiṃha and Niśumbha is inserted within the general frame of the story and told at length. The first two were half-brothers who were very close, especially after their parents died when they were quite young. King Niśumbha sent a messenger, pretending he wished to protect them from their enemies’ attacks. The Vāsudeva Puruṣasiṃha, who received the messenger, felt seriously insulted and refused the offer. A war started between Puruṣasiṃha and the Prati-vāsudeva king, whose mutual hatred continues from their previous births. Then Puruṣasiṃha had been a king defeated by the king who was Niśumbha’s previous birth, and had formed the resolution that he would take revenge on him in his next life. Thus it came to pass that Puruṣasiṃha killed him.

Dharma is mainly praised alongside other Jinas in hymns dedicated to the 24 Jinas. One instance is the devotional song dedicated to this Jina in the Gujarati set of hymns composed by Yaśovijaya in the 17th century. This example can be found among the manuscripts digitised on JAINpedia.

Temples and images

Hutheesing temple
Image by Kalyan Shah © CC BY-SA 3.0

Dharmanātha or Lord Dharma is not one of the most popular Jinas. Yet he is known through a number of stone sculptures, such as those:

• in caves 8 and 9 at Khanda-giri in Orissa
• sculptures in the western Indian temples of Vimala Vasahi at Mount Abu
• sculptures at the Shivpuri Museum, Madhya Pradesh
• at Shravana Belgola, Venur and Mudbidri in Karnataka, along with sculptures of other Jinas.

Metal images showing Dharma alone or with other Jinas are also available in temples and museums.

There are some famous temples dedicated to Dharma, in which a statue of him is the main image – mūla-nāyaka. One of the best known is the Hutheesing temple in Ahmedabad, ‘outside Delhi Gate on the right side of the road leading to the Shahibag area’ (Dhaky 1998: 24). Worthy of note is the fact that this 19th-century temple is not called after the Jina, as is more usual, but after the sponsor who paid for its construction. Sheth Hutheesing was a wealthy businessman from an Ahmedabad family deeply engaged in the silk trade. Exporting opium to China and importing silk on the return journey was one of the main roads to wealth during that period, which he followed. In 1845 Hutheesing initiated the building of a new temple. After his sudden death, his widow, Harkumvar, continued the project. The temple was consecrated by Ācārya Śāntisāgara-sūri of the Sāgara-gaccha on 5 February 1847.

There is a large figure of Dharma in the central sanctuary of the Hutheesing temple and another one in the left-hand image chamber. An image of the first Jina, Ṛṣabhanatha or Lord Ṛṣabha, is housed in the right-hand chamber. The inscription on the pedestal of the main image records its installation and says ‘it was carved for the spiritual bliss of Harakumarbāī’, the wife of Hatheesing, on 5 February 1847.