Article: Banārasīdās

Examples of types of living beings
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Based on Digambara philosophy, the Adhyātma lay movement flourished in several cities of northern India during Banārasīdās’s lifetime. Though he was born into a Śvetāmbara family, Banārasīdās was seen as the leader of the movement by the end of his life. His association with this movement followed his exploration of various religions and viewpoints.

Throughout his life, Banārasīdās had questioned his family religion and looked for spiritual fulfilment from different sources. After studying the major Jain scriptures, he became a devotee of ritual. Tricked by a false ascetic, he recited a mantra that would allow him to earn money. Misled by a false yogi, he became a devotee of the Hindu god Śiva and worshipped a white conch for a year. After this, his first contact with Adhyātma was decisive for his career.

The Adhyātma movement was founded in the middle of the 16th century in the cities of north India, mainly Agra, Delhi, Jaipur and Sanganer. During meetings, Jain lay men discussed philosophical tenets such as:

• self
• meditation
• knowledge
• karma theory.

Together, they read important philosophical and doctrinal Jain works such as Kundakunda‘s Samayasāra and its commentaries. This Prakrit work of the 2nd to 3rd century caused a deep change in Banārasīdās’s thought and behaviour. In this work Kundakunda makes a distinction between:

• the conventional point of view – vyavahāra-naya – which invites devotees to perform religious rituals
• the absolute point of view – niścaya-naya – which goes beyond the practical life and invites truth-seekers to focus on the Supreme Self instead of following meaningless rules.

When Banārasīdās read this work and its commentaries, he became an ardent anti-ritual lay man, disregarding ritual-based practice of worship.

Banārasīdās finally found his own path after reading Nemicandra’s Gommaṭasāra. This 10th-century work expounds the ‘Scale of Qualities’ from delusion to omniscience, dividing spiritual progress into 14 stages – guṇasthāna. Banārasīdās understood that each human being should act in accordance with the degree of spiritual elevation he has reached. This theory allowed him to seek the Supreme Self while continuing his commercial activities.

Banārasīdās throws away his poem
Image by unknown © unknown

The first text Banārasīdās wrote in his youth was a treatise on the ‘Nine Sentiments’ – nava-rasa. These rasas are described by Indian poetics as:

1. love – śṛṅgāra
2. heroism – vīra
3. disgust – bībhatsa
4. anger – raudra
5. mirth – hāsya
6. fear – bhayānaka
7. pity – kāruṇa
8. wonder – adbhuta
9. tranquillity – śānta.

After confessing that the text focused on ‘love’, Banārasīdās considered himself a ‘bad poet’ and denied his Navarasa by throwing the sheets of his manuscript into the River Gomati.

A picture promoting Jainism shows him sitting in a boat, the papers floating on the water. The caption of the picture is explicit: ‘When his religious views had changed [that is, when he became a resolute Jain], the great poet Banārasīdās threw his Navarasa composition in the Gomati River’.

Pandit Rājamalla Paṇḍe
Image by unknown © AtmaDharma.com

The most significant Banārasīdās work on spiritual matters is probably the Samayasāra Nāṭaka.

One of the turning points in Banārasīdās’s life was sparked by a text and its commentary. The crucial moment came when a member of the Adhyātma movement named Arthamal Ḍhor gave him a copy of a Hindi commentary on Kundakunda’s Samayasāra. Ḍhor said to him, ‘Read this text and you will understand the truth.’

Banārasīdās called this text a nāṭaka – drama. The word ‘nāṭaka’ was used chiefly for commentaries on the Samayasāra that present a kind of drama with the soul as the main character. This commentary was written by Rājamalla Paṇḍe in the 16th century. Reading it was a life-changing event for Banārasīdās. From this moment, he wanted to attain the Supreme Self but did not really know how to do so. He said he stood like ‘a camel fart’, which never goes in any direction, a situation that lasted till he read Nemicandra’s Gommaṭasāra.

Profoundly inspired, Banārasīdās wrote a Samayasāra Nāṭaka of his own. His commentary on the Samayasāra of Kundakunda is quite a long work, numbering about 750 verses divided into 13 chapters, compared with Kundakunda’s 415 verses in 10 chapters. His commentary includes a chapter of 100 verses devoted to enlightening discovery of the 14 guṇasthānas.