Old NCERT Summary (RS Sharma) Religious Movements in Later Vedic Period - History

Introduction

Numerous religious sects arose in the middle Gangetic plains in the second half of the sixth century B.C. Of these sects, Jainism and Buddhism were the most important. Both emerged as powerful religious reform movements that challenged the ritualism and social hierarchy of the Vedic-Brahmanical order and offered alternative ethical and spiritual paths to large sections of society.

Jainism

Causes of Origin

• Post-Vedic society in the Gangetic region was organised into a fourfold varna system: Brahmanas, Kshatriyas, Vaishyas, and Shudras.
• The four varnas were assigned distinct social functions and status. Brahmanas served as priests and teachers and claimed the highest status. Kshatriyas were rulers and warriors; Vaishyas engaged in agriculture, cattle-rearing and trade; Shudras performed service roles for the other three varnas.
• The varna system emphasised heredity of status. This birth-based hierarchy generated social tensions and discontent among groups whose economic or political power had grown, but who lacked commensurate ritual status.
• The Kshatriya reaction to priestly dominance was a significant factor in the emergence of new religious currents. Both Vardhamana Mahavira (founder of Jainism) and Gautama Buddha (founder of Buddhism) came from Kshatriya families and questioned Brahmanical authority.
• The spread of a new agrarian economy in north-eastern India contributed to religious change. From about 600 B.C., use of iron implements made forest clearance, plough cultivation and larger settlements possible. Stable agrarian economy required protection of cattle and systematic animal husbandry, practices often at odds with Vedic sacrificial killing of cattle.
• New urban centres arose in the region-examples include Kaushambi, Kushinagar, Banaras, Vaishali, Chirand and Rajgir. These towns had artisans and traders who increasingly used money in transactions.
• Punch-marked coins, among the earliest Indian coins, first circulated in eastern Uttar Pradesh and Bihar in the fifth century B.C. The growth of trade increased the social and economic importance of the Vaishyas, who therefore sought religious alternatives that would recognise their standing.

Symbol of Jainism

Vardhamana Mahavira and the Origins of Jainism

Vardhamana Mahavira

• Jain tradition traces the religion to a long line of twenty-four Tirthankaras (spiritual teachers). The first is said to be Rishabhadev (born in Ayodhya), credited with establishing social order. The twenty-third was Parshvanath (born in Varanasi), and the twenty-fourth was Vardhamana Mahavira.
• According to tradition, Mahavira was born in either 599 B.C. or 540 B.C. (two traditions exist) in Kundagrama near Vaishali (identified with modern Basarh, Vaishali district, Bihar). His father was Siddhartha, head of the Jnatrika Kshatriya clan; his mother was Trishala, sister of the Lichchhavi chief Chetaka.
• Mahavira lived initially as a householder. At about the age of 30 he renounced domestic life and became an ascetic. After twelve years of severe discipline he attained kaivalya (spiritual emancipation or absolute release) at age 42 and thereafter preached for approximately thirty years.
• He travelled through Kosala, Magadha, Mithila, Champa and other regions to propagate his teachings. He is called Mahavira (the "great victor" or "Jina", the conqueror of passions). He is said to have died at Pawapuri (near modern Rajgir) at an age given variously as 72 (tradition linking to 468 B.C.) or earlier, depending on chronology adopted.

 Lord Parshvanath 

Doctrines of Jainism

• Jain moral teaching emphasises strict ethical principles. The classical five vows often attributed to Jain teachings are: non-violence (ahimsa), truthfulness, not stealing, non-possession or non-acquisitiveness, and celibacy or continence (brahmacharya). Later Jaina tradition counts these as the fundamental rules for ascetics and as ideals for lay followers.
• Ahimsa (non-injury) is central to Jain doctrine. Jains extended the principle of non-violence to the greatest practicable degree and developed careful rules to avoid harm to all living beings.
• Jainism prescribes liberation through three complementary practices known as the Three Jewels (Triratna): right knowledge, right faith, and right conduct. Liberation is achieved by freeing the soul from karmic bonds rather than by ritual or priestly mediation.
• Because agriculture and war involve injury to living beings, early Jaina ascetics discouraged their followers from taking part in such activities; many Jains concentrated on trade and mercantile occupations.
• Later Jainism developed into two major sects: the Svetambaras ("white-clad") who wear simple white robes, and the Digambaras ("sky-clad") who traditionally emphasised nudity for renunciants as a sign of complete renunciation.

Spread of Jainism

• Mahavira organised his followers into an order that accepted both men and women. His organised sangha helped spread the teachings across the Gangetic region.
• Later traditions hold that Chandragupta Maurya (third century B.C. in some accounts) became a Jaina and spent his final years as an ascetic in the South; however, the earliest solid epigraphic evidence for Jainism in Karnataka dates from around the third century A.D.
• A long famine in Magadha (recorded in later Jaina tradition as occurring about two centuries after Mahavira's death) is said to have led many Jain ascetics, led by Bhadrabahu, to migrate south. Those who remained in Magadha were led by Sthulibahu. Differences that arose between the two groups contributed to sectarian division.
• A council convened at Pataliputra (modern Patna) to compile Jaina texts was rejected by the southern group; from these events the distinction between Digambaras (southern tradition) and Svetambaras (Magadhan tradition) is traditionally explained.
• Jainism spread to Kalinga (Orissa) by the fourth century B.C. and enjoyed royal patronage in later periods (for example, under the Kalinga king Kharavela in the first century B.C.). In South India, many Jaina monastic institutions (basadis) and inscriptions appear from later centuries; monarchs granted land to support these establishments.

Contribution of Jainism

• Jainism challenged the exclusivity of Vedic ritual and the social supremacy of the Brahmanas in important ways.
• The Jaina tradition used regional Prakrit languages rather than classical Sanskrit to communicate with common people. Religious texts were composed in Ardhamagadhi and other Prakrits; major compilations of Jaina scriptures took place later (for example, the sixth century A.D. council at Valabhi is associated in tradition with textual redaction).
• The use of Prakrit by Jain authors helped develop regional languages. Dialects of Prakrit such as Sauraseni contributed to the formation of languages like Marathi, and Jain authors also wrote extensively in early forms of Kannada.
• Jain monastic and lay literature made a lasting contribution to Indian ethics, regional literatures and temple and sculptural patronage in regions where Jainism flourished.

Gautama Buddha and Buddhism

Gautam Buddha

• Gautama Buddha (also called Siddhartha Gautama) is traditionally dated to c. 563-483 B.C. in many texts; these dates are approximate and multiple chronologies exist. He was born into a Shakya Kshatriya family in Lumbini (in present-day Nepal) near Kapilavastu; sites such as Piprahwa in Basti district have been identified with the region of Kapilavastu.
• His father appears to have been the elected head of the Shakya clan; his mother had connections with the Kosala royal family. Like Mahavira, Siddhartha belonged to a noble household and went through the conventional formative stages of Kshatriya life.
• At about the age of 29 he left home in search of a solution to suffering. After about seven years of austere practices he abandoned extreme asceticism and, meditating under a pipal (fig) tree at Bodh Gaya, attained awakening (enlightenment) at about the age of 35.
• After enlightenment he became known as the Buddha ("the Awakened One") and gave his first sermon at Sarnath near Banaras. He preached for many years and is traditionally said to have died at about age 80 at Kushinagar (identified with the modern village Kasia in Deoria district, eastern Uttar Pradesh).

Doctrines of Buddhism

• The Buddha taught a practical path to overcome suffering. Central to his teaching is the Eightfold Path (Aṣṭaṅga-mārga), a set of interrelated practices that lead to the cessation of suffering: right view (understanding), right intention (resolve), right speech, right action, right livelihood, right effort, right mindfulness, and right concentration (meditation).
• The Buddha emphasised the Middle Path-avoiding the extremes of self-indulgence and self-mortification-and taught that liberation (nirvana) is reached by ethical conduct, mental discipline and insight rather than by ritual sacrifice or caste privilege.
• He laid down a code of conduct for monks and lay followers similar in spirit to other contemporary reformers. Typical social ethical injunctions included abstaining from theft, falsehood, intoxication, violence and corrupt practices, and respecting the property and rights of others.

Special Features of Buddhism and Causes of Its Spread

• Buddhism does not centre on belief in a creator god; its analysis concerns suffering and its cessation. The doctrine of anatman (non-eternal, non-substantial self) and emphasis on dependent origination was a radical departure from some orthodox Vedic metaphysical ideas.
• Buddhism attacked the social privileges associated with the varna system and admitted members to the religious order irrespective of caste. This made it attractive to lower orders and groups excluded from Vedic learning.
• Women were admitted into the sangha (religious community), giving them a recognised spiritual role. The Buddhist sangha was therefore more socially inclusive than the orthodox priestly institutions.
• The use of Pali, a language closely related to the speech of ordinary people, helped propagate Buddhist teachings beyond elites who knew Sanskrit.
• Entry into the sangha required adherence to vows of poverty, celibacy and ethical discipline, but membership was open to all who accepted the rules regardless of caste or sex.
• The three central elements of Buddhist practice are often listed as Buddha (the teacher), Dharma (the teaching), and Sangha (the community).

• Political and popular adoption aided the spread of Buddhism. Kingdoms such as Magadha, Kosala and Kaushambi, and various republican polities, received Buddhist teachers and sympathisers.
• About two centuries after the Buddha's death the Maurya emperor Ashoka embraced Buddhism and actively patronised it. Through state support and missionary activity, Buddhism spread to Central Asia, West Asia and Sri Lanka, becoming an international religion and later influencing Tibet, Southeast Asia, China, Korea and Japan.

Importance and Influence of Buddhism

• Although organised Buddhism eventually declined in India, its social, cultural and intellectual impact was profound and long-lasting.
• Buddhism's objective was individual liberation (the attainment of nirvana) but its social teachings expanded religious opportunity for women and the lower social orders, challenging caste-based exclusions of Brahmanical practice.
• Its emphasis on non-violence and protection of animal life supported interests of agrarian and pastoral communities and helped foster regard for cattle as valuable to the economy.
• Buddhist monks produced a large body of literature in Pali and later in hybrid Sanskrit. Early Buddhist literature can be grouped broadly into material that records the Buddha's sayings and teachings; disciplinary rules for the sangha; and systematic philosophical expositions of the dhamma (the teaching).
• Between the first and third centuries of the common era Buddhist authors blended Pali and Sanskrit forms to create literary styles sometimes called Hybrid Sanskrit. Buddhist scholars continued literary activities into medieval periods, and some important Apabhramsa and regional works were composed by Buddhist authors.
• Buddhist monasteries functioned as residential learning centres-comparable to universities. Notable examples include Nalanda and Vikramashila in Bihar and Valabhi in Gujarat, which attracted students and scholars from many regions.
• Buddhism influenced art and architecture. The earliest large-scale human images in Indian religious art were probably of the Buddha. From the first century A.D., sculptural panels and statues of the Buddha became common.
• The interaction of Hellenistic and Indian artists on the north-west frontier produced the characteristic Gandhara style, which combined Greco-Roman and Indian elements. Rock-cut architecture and monastic cells were hewn in places such as the Barabar caves in Gaya and in western India around Nashik; cave architecture later flourished in other regions as well.
• Buddhist art and learning also prospered in the Krishna delta in the south and at Mathura in the north, leaving an enduring artistic and intellectual legacy across the subcontinent and beyond.