Article: Kunthu

Peaks of Mount Sammeta
Image by CaptVijay © public domain

Of the five auspicious events that mark a Jina’s life – kalyāṇakas – four take place on earth and are associated with a specific village or town in the sources. Archaeological evidence often helps to identify the old names with modern places. Even when it is lacking, there is a tendency to carry out this identification process. Associating auspicious events with certain locations makes these places sacred to Jains, so that they are potential or actual pilgrimage places and temple sites.

Hastināpura or Hastinapur is located 37 kilometres from Meerut, in Uttar Pradesh. Today a large village, it is a place of high antiquity, a site of prehistoric culture and the capital town of the Pāṇḍava lineage, famous from the Mahābhārata epics. Its importance as a Jain sacred place comes from its association with several Jinas. It is the birth place of the three Jinas who are also Cakravartins:

• 16th Jina, Śāntinātha or Lord Śānti
• 17th Jina Kunthunātha or Lord Kunthu
• 18th Jina Aranātha or Lord Ara.

It is also the place where the first Jina, Ṛṣabhanātha or Lord Ṛṣabha, is said to have broken his year-long fast when Prince Śreyāṃsa gave him sugar-cane juice. This first alms-giving event is commemorated during the Akṣaya-tṛtīyā festival.

The sites of the old temple dedicated to Kunthu and the other two Jinas born there are today marked by holy footprints – pādukās – in the remote countryside. Those of Kunthu were restored in 1917.

In today’s Hastinapur, the main Śvetāmbara temple is dedicated to Śānti. The main temple image of Śānti is flanked by Kunthu and Ara on the right and left respectively. Thus the three Jinas traditionally connected with the locality are shown together.

Worship of Kunthu
Image by Anishshah19 © public domain

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.

The dates of all events except emancipation are recorded, for instance, in the above-mentioned composition by the 14th-century Śvetāmbara monk, Jinaprabha-sūri (Balbir 1990: 187).

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

Universal gathering and fourfold community
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.

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

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 Kunthunātha or Lord Kunthu is named Vijayā. On this occasion, he is accompanied by numerous kings.

He performs a two-day fast. The next day he breaks his fast at the house of King Vyāghrasiṃha in the town of Cakrapura.

Kunthu wanders for 16 years as an ordinary ascetic and reaches omniscience under a tree of the tilaka variety.

Figure of Kunthu
Image by Brooklyn Museum Collection © CC BY-NC

Kunthunātha or Lord Kunthu is not one of the most popular Jinas. Yet he is known through at least a few temples dedicated to him or isolated images. He seems to have been more popular in south India, at least in medieval times.

One of the most ancient temples dedicated to this Jina is in Karandai, about 15 kms from Kanchipuram in Tamil Nadu. This place, also known as Munigiri, was an important Jain centre until the 13th century.

One of the main temples to the 17th Jina is the Kunthunatha Jinalaya at Kamalapur, a village south of Hampi, in the Bellary district of Karnatak. This temple complex is also known as the Ganagitti temple. An inscription found on the pillar – māna-stambha – in front of the building records that it was buiIt by Iruguppa Daṇḍanāyaka, the minister of Bukkarāya II, in the reign of the Vijayanagara king Harihara II and that it was dedicated to Kunthunātha (Suresh 2004: 325; 2011: 185–188). However, the cella that originally housed the image is now empty. Jina sculptures are found in other parts of the temple, though. ‘It is one of the earliest Jina temples of the Vijayanagara period, well preserved and in good condition’ (Suresh 2004: 326).

This 19th-century watercolour from the Mackenzie Collection kept in the British Library probably depicts this temple.

Another temple in Karnatak is the Sri Kuntunatha Basadi in the Indira Nagar or Ittegegood area of Mysore. This is a modern temple, which was inaugurated in 1997. The main idol of Kunthu is flanked by images of the:

• 12th Jina, Vāsupūjyanātha or Lord Vāsupūjya, on the left
• 23rd Jina, Pārśvanātha or Lord Pārśva, on the right.

Instances of stone sculptures of Kunthu are:

• a seated figure with emblem in the caves 8 and 9 of Khandagiri, Orissa
• a big 12th-century standing image at Bajrangagadha, Guna in Madhya Pradesh (Shah 1987: 157)
• a 7th- to 8th-century figure with emblem at the Bharata Kala Bhavana in Varanasi (Shah 1987: 157) and other images, mostly of Digambara style, in north Indian museums
• 12th- and 13th-century images in the Vimala Vasahi on Mount Abu, identified through inscriptions.

Examples of metal images in various collections are:

• bronze images from the 11th century found in the Aluara hoard, now in the Patna Museum (Shah 1097: 157).
• a bronze image dated 1470 in the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, where the Jina is identified in the inscription at the back
• a bronze figure produced in 1476 in Vasantgarh, Rajasthan, kept in the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, where an emblem, which should be the goat, is visible
• a small idol in the Brooklyn Museum, New York
• a 12th-century image in the Huntington collection, based at Ohio State University.