Wu-Violence Virtue and Spiritual Liberation A Preliminary Survey of Buddhist and Jaina Stories of Future Rebirths of Shrenika Bimbisara and Kunika Ajatashatru PDF

Religions of South Asia 8.
2 (2014) 149-179 ISSN (print) 1751-2689

doi:10.1558/rosa.v8i2.149 ISSN (online) 1751-2697
Violence, Virtue and Spiritual Liberation:

A Preliminary Survey of Buddhist and Jaina
Stories of Future Rebirths of Śreṇika Bimbisāra
and Kūṇika Ajātaśatru
Juan Wu1
Department of Indian Philosophy and Buddhist Studies
University of Tokyo
7-3-1 Hongo, Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo 113-0033
Japan
wujuan728@gmail.com
ABSTRACT: The Magadhan king Śreṇika Bimbisāra and his son Kūṇika Ajātaśatru
are widely featured in both Buddhist and Jaina literature. Previous studies have
generally focused on the parallels between Buddhist and Jaina depictions of these
two figures. Rather less attention has been devoted to exploring how or why the
Buddhist and Jaina stories about them differ. This article contrasts the Buddhist
and Jaina accounts of their future rebirths. Whereas the Jainas spoke much of
Śreṇika’s eventual jinahood and kept silent on Kūṇika’s future destiny, the Bud-
dhists said little about Bimbisāra’s future destiny, while giving several prophecies
of Ajātaśatru’s eventual awakening. Based on a comparative survey of the Bud-
dhist and Jaina accounts, the article argues that the Buddhist and Jaina authors
held significantly different understandings of how key religious factors such as
karma, the Dharma, the power of the Buddha or Mahāvīra, and an individual’s in-
herent spiritual potential play out in soteriological discourse. It also argues that
the Buddhist prophecies of Ajātaśatru and the Jaina prophecies of Śreṇika share a
common idea that moral culpability has no permanent karmic effects, thus consti-
tuting no real obstacle to spiritual growth in the long run.
KEYWORDS: Ajātaśatru/Kūṇika; Bimbisāra/Śreṇika; karma; rebirth; soteriology.
1. Juan Wu is a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Tokyo. She graduated from Peking Uni-
versity (MA, Buddhist Studies) and obtained her PhD from Cardiff University with a disserta-
tion on Indian Buddhist narratives of Ajātaśatru. Her recent publications include ‘Stories of
King Bimbisāra and His Son Ajātaśatru in the Cīvaravastu of the Mūlasarvāstivāda-vinaya and
Some Śvetāmbara Jaina Texts’ (Indo Tetsugaku Bukkyōgaku Kenkyū インド哲学仏教学研究 /
Studies in Indian Philosophy and Buddhism 21 [2014]: 19–47), and ‘The Story of the Previous Life
of Ajātaśatru/Kūṇika in Buddhist and Śvetāmbara Jain Texts’ (Journal of Indian and Buddhist
Studies 62 (3) [2014]: 109–14).
© Equinox Publishing Ltd 2014, Office 415, The Workstation, 15 Paternoster Row, Sheffield S1 2BX.
150 religions of south asia
Introduction
As two prominent kings of Magadha at the time of the Buddha and Mahāvīra,
Bimbisāra (known to the Jainas mostly as Śreṇika) and his son Ajātaśatru
(known to the Jainas as Kūṇika) are widely featured in both Buddhist and Jaina
literature.2 Both Buddhists and Jainas claimed them to be devotees of their
own religious leaders, and both shared a common narrative that Ajātaśatru/
Kūṇika, in order to usurp the throne, causes the death of his father Bimbisāra/
Śreṇika in prison.3 While much scholarly attention has been paid to such par-
allels between the Buddhist and Jaina depictions of Bimbisāra/Śreṇika and
Ajātaśatru/Kūṇika, rather less attention has been devoted to exploring how
differently the Buddhists and Jainas told stories about them, or why the dif-
ferences occurred.
One fact that has been largely neglected is that the Buddhists and Jainas
held considerably different opinions on the future rebirths of Bimbisāra/
Śreṇika and Ajātaśatru/Kūṇika. According to the Jainas, although Śreṇika
will go to hell in his next birth due to his bad karma, in his following birth he
will become the first tīrthaṅkara of the coming age.4 In Buddhist traditions,
Bimbisāra is said to be reborn in the heaven of King Vaiśravaṇa in his next life,
and there seems to be no definitive prediction of his attainment of bodhi or
nirvāṇa. As for Ajātaśatru/Kūṇika, while Jaina sources tell us nothing further
than that he is killed by a cave deity and then falls into hell, a number of Bud-
dhist texts show that although Ajātaśatru, in consequence of his patricide,
will go to hell in his next birth, he will subsequently be released from hell and
eventually attain parinirvāṇa after becoming a pratyekabuddha or a perfectly
awakened buddha.
There is an interesting contrast between the Buddhists and Jainas in their
attitudes towards the salvation of Bimbisāra/Śreṇika and Ajātaśatru/Kūṇika,
if we define ‘salvation’ as complete liberation from the cycle of rebirths
(saṃsāra). The contrast is this: While the Jainas focused on the salvation of
Śreṇika rather than that of his son Kūṇika, some Buddhists were more con-
cerned with the salvation of the patricide Ajātaśatru than that of his victim-
ized father.
2. For summaries of Buddhist stories about the two figures, see Akanuma (1931: 10–12, s.v.
Ajātasattu Vedehiputta; 99–102, s.v. Bimbisāra); Malalasekera (1937–1938: i. 31–35, s.v.
Ajātasattu; ii. 285–89, s.v. Bimbisāra). For summaries of stories about them in Śvetāmbara
Jaina literature, see Mehta and Chandra (1970–1972: i. 196–97, s.v. Kūṇia; ii. 856–57, s.v. 1.
Seṇia).
3. The most detailed study to date of this shared narrative is Silk (1997). See also earlier ob-
servations by Jacobi (1879: 2, 5); Bühler (1887: 20–21; 1903: 27–28); Tawney (1895: xx–xxi,
175–78); Deleu (1969: 87–88); trans. de Jong and Wiles (1996: 28).
4. The term tīrthaṅkara (‘ford-maker’) refers to ‘a human being who has attained omniscience
(kevala-jñāna) through his own efforts and who teaches others the path to liberation
(mokṣa-mārga), thereby establishing a ford (tīrtha) across the river of rebirth (saṃsāra)’ (Wiley
2004: 217–18, s.v. Tīrthaṅkara).
© Equinox Publishing Ltd 2014.

Wu Violence, Virtue and Spiritual Liberation 151
The present article will take a closer look at this contrast. It seeks to under-
stand how differently the Buddhists and Jainas in ancient India portrayed the
future rebirths of Bimbisāra/Śreṇika and Ajātasatru/Kūṇika, and what we can
learn from such differences about the Buddhists and Jainas themselves, espe-
cially regarding their karmic views and soteriological approaches. I will first
introduce Buddhist accounts of future rebirths of Bimbisāra and Ajātaśatru,
and then explore Jaina accounts of future rebirths of Śreṇika and Kūṇika.
Finally, through comparing the Buddhist and Jaina accounts, I will look into
the different attitudes of the Buddhist and Jaina authors towards the karmic
law and other religious factors, such as the salvific power of their religious
leader (the Buddha or Mahāvīra) and the efficacy of their doctrine.
Future Rebirths of Bimbisāra and

Ajātaśatru in Buddhist Sources
Bimbisāra’s Spiritual Attainment in This Life and His Ensuing Rebirth(s)
In Buddhist literature, the image of King Bimbisāra is overall very positive. He

almost always appears as an exemplary virtuous man who holds deep devotion
to the Buddha and his community. Several Indian Buddhist texts tell the story
of Bimbisāra visiting the Buddha and gaining the Dharma-eye (dharmacakṣu)
or the status of stream-winner (srotāpanna) after hearing a sermon preached
by him.5 The acquisition of the Dharma-eye is usually said to be equivalent to
attaining one of the three stages (srotāpanna, sakṛdāgāmin ‘once-returner’, and
anāgāmin ‘non-returner’) leading to arhatship. According to canonical sourc-
es, a stream-winner will never fall into the lower destinies and is assured of
attaining arhatship within seven more lifetimes.6 Thus Bimbisāra’s attainment
of the Dharma-eye or the status of stream-winner implies that he will sooner
or later attain arhatship and nirvāṇa. This is the case from a theoretical point
of view. In reality, there seems to be no definitive prediction of Bimbisāra’s
attainment of bodhi or nirvāṇa in extant Buddhist literature. As we will see,
there is only one Buddhist text preserved in Chinese (T. 1[4]) that mentions in
5. For Pāli and Chinese sources on this story, see Mori, Motozawa and Iwai (2000: 148–
52). The story also appears in Sanskrit sources such as the Saṅghabhedavastu of the
Mūlasarvāstivāda-vinaya (Gnoli 1977–1978: i. 157.6–161.9 (text); Panglung 1981: 89 (summary
of the Tibetan version)), the Catuṣpariṣatsūtra (Waldschmidt 1952–1962: iii. 350–70, §§27e.1–
27f.25 (text and parallels)), the Bimbasārasūtra (Waldschmidt 1932: 120–45 (text and paral-
lels)), and the Mahāvastu (Senart 1882–1897: iii. 436.21–49.10 (text); Jones 1949–1956: iii.
439–50 (English trans.); Hiraoka 2010: ii. 496–504 (Japanese trans.)).
6. See, for instance, AN I 233.12-15: so tiṇṇaṃ saṃyojanānaṃ parikkhayā sattakkhattuparamo hoti
sattakkhattuparamaṃ deve ca mānuse ca sandhāvitvā saṃsāritvā dukkhassa antaṃ karoti, ‘Be-
cause of the destruction of three fetters, one is [destined to be reborn] seven times at most.
Having traversed and transmigrated seven times at most among gods and humans, he puts
an end to suffering’; trans. also in Woodward (1932: 213).

passing his ultimate liberation. The scarcity of the information on Bimbisāra’s

future spiritual attainment suggests that Indian Buddhist authors in general
felt no particular urge to grant awakening to this typically righteous man who
has already embarked on the path to liberation.
There are two groups of Buddhist sources telling us what happens to
Bimbisāra after his death. The first comprises the Janavasabha-sutta (No.
18) of the Pāli Dīgha-nikāya and its two Chinese parallels, the Shenisha-jing
闍尼沙經 (*Janeṣaha-sūtra [pronounced as *Janeṣa’ao]) collected in the Chi-
nese translation of the Dīrghāgama (T. 1[4]) and the freestanding Renxian-jing
人仙經 (*Janarṣi-sūtra, T. 9).7 All of them describe Bimbisāra’s afterlife in a
context unrelated to the patricide of Ajātaśatru.
According to the Pāli version, Bimbisāra becomes a stream-winner in this
world, and having died, he is reborn seven times in the heaven of Vessavaṇa,
as a yakkha named Janavasabha. In his seventh heavenly rebirth, he visits the
Buddha to express his wish to become a once-returner.8 The sutta says noth-
ing about whether Janavasabha’s wish will be fulfilled. This silence is explicable
to some extent, because as a stream-winner Janavasabha is destined to attain
nibbāna within seven rebirths at most and it is impossible for him to take an
eighth rebirth, whether in heaven or in this world.9 We may assume that Jana
vasabha will become an arahat and then enter into nibbāna during his seventh
7. On the use of the asterisk (*), see ‘A Note on Citation and Technical Details’ at the end of
this article. The reference number T. 1[4] means that this is the fourth sūtra in the Chinese
Dīrghāgama (T. 1). According to Pulleyblank (1991), the Early Middle Chinese pronunciation
of She-ni-sha 闍尼沙 may be reconstructed as ʥia-nri-ʂai. Karashima (1994: 91) convincingly
shows that the Indic original of the Chinese transliteration She-ni-sha may well have been
Pkt. *Janeṣaha (< *Janeṣabha < Jana + *iṣabha < Skt. Jana + ṛṣabha), pronounced as *Janeṣa’a.
The Chinese interpretation 勝結使 (lit. ‘Victorious over fetters and instigations [?]’), that
immediately follows the transliteration She-ni-sha 闍尼沙 in our text (cf. T. 1. 34c14), seems
to have been based on Pkt. *Jina-āsrava/āśrava [or aṣava as in Gāndhārī?] which was differ-
ent from the Indic original of She-ni-sha. It is likely that this Chinese interpretation was not
written by the translators of the Chinese Dīrghāgama themselves, but by another unknown
person [I thank Professor Seishi Karashima for his suggestion on this point; email 23 Octo-
ber 2014]. In the present text, She-ni-sha is the name of Bimbisāra in his next life as a yakṣa.
The name is preserved as Jinarṣabha in the Saṅghabhedavastu of the Mūlasarvāstivāda-vinaya
(Gnoli 1977-1978: ii. 159.9-10), as Janarṣabha in a Central Asian Sanskrit fragment (SHT, IV
165, Fragment 18V c), and as Jinayabha in a Sanskrit manuscript of the Dīrghāgama from
Greater Gandhāra (see Hartmann 2004: 126 and n.16).
8. DN II 206. 6–7 and 11–12: idaṃ sattamaṃ kho ahaṃ bhante Vessavaṇassa mahārājassa sahav
yataṃ uppajjāmi…dīgharattaṃ kho ahaṃ bhante avinipāto avinipātaṃ sañjānāmi, āsā ca pana me
santiṭṭhati sakadāgāmitāyā ti, ‘Sir, this is the seventh time I have been reborn into the com-
panionship of the great king Vessavaṇa… For a long time, Sir, I have been exempt from the
evil destinies [and] I have been aware of my exemption from the evil destinies. And now the
desire for the status of once-returner arises in me.’
9. Malalasekera (1937–1938: ii. 289) suggests that Bimbisāra’s wish to become a once-returner
in the Janavasabha-sutta ‘may have been fulfilled’. This strikes me as impossible, for if his
wish were fulfilled, he would have to take an eighth rebirth after becoming a stream-
winner, which is against the canonical definition of stream-winner (see above, n. 6).

life in the heaven of Vessavaṇa, although neither the sutta itself nor Buddha
ghosa’s commentary thereon offers any such information. The Chinese version
T. 9 likewise speaks of Bimbisāra’s visit to the Buddha in his seventh rebirth in
the heaven of Vaiśravaṇa and his wish to become a once-returner. Also like the
Pāli version, T. 9 says nothing about Bimbisāra’s ultimate liberation.
The Chinese Dīrghāgama version of the sūtra (T. 1[4]) makes no mention of
Bimbisāra’s wish to become a once-returner. According to that version, he is
reborn as a son of Vaiśravaṇa, named *Janeṣaha (see above note 7). During
his visit to the Buddha, he says the following (which is in turn related by the
Buddha to Ānanda): ‘I have attained the status of stream-winner, not liable
to fall into the evil destinies. [After] completing a maximum of seven returns
[i.e., rebirths], I will then put an end to suffering. For seven lifetimes [since
becoming a stream-winner], I have always been named *Janeṣaha.’10 This
statement is the only reference to Bimbisāra’s ultimate liberation I have so far
identified in Buddhist literature. It indicates that *Janeṣaha/Bimbisāra will
attain liberation in his seventh rebirth after becoming a stream-winner, pre-
sumably in the heaven of Vaiśravaṇa.
The second group of Buddhist sources on Bimbisāra’s afterlife presents
his death and rebirth within the context of the patricide story of Ajātaśatru.
This group includes the Saṅghabhedavastu (‘Section on Schism’) of the Mūla
sarvāstivāda-vinaya,11 Buddhaghosa’s commentary on the Sāmaññaphala-sutta
(‘Discourse on the Fruits of the Ascetic Life’),12 the *Abhidharma-mahāvibhāṣā
(‘Great Commentary on the Abhidharma’),13 the Weishengyuan-jing 未生寃經
(*Ajātaśatru-sūtra),14 and the Ajātaśatrupitṛdrohāvadāna (‘Story of Ajātaśatru’s
Malice towards His Father’) of the Bodhisattvāvadānakalpalatā (‘Wish-Fulfilling
Garland of Tales of the Bodhisattva’) composed by Kṣemendra in 1052 ce.15
10. T. 1.35a8-10: 得須陀洹, 不墮惡趣。極七往返, 乃盡苦際。於七生中, 常名闍尼沙. The former
part of this phrase (得須陀洹…乃盡苦際 ‘[I] have attained the status of stream-winner…
[I] will then put an end to suffering’) also appears earlier in the *Janeṣaha-sūtra (see T.
1.34b18), referring to five hundred people of Nādikā whose future destinies are proph-
esied by the Buddha, and corresponding to (chrotaāpannā avinipā)tadharmāṇo niyataṃ
saṃbodhiparāyaṇāḥ saptakṛtvaḥ paramāḥ sap(takṛtvo de)vāṃś ca manuṣyāṃ(ś ca saṃdhāvya
saṃsṛtya duḥkhasyāntaṃ kariṣyanti) in the Mahāparinirvāṇa-sūtra of Sarvāstivādins (Wald-
schmidt 1950–1951: ii. 168, §9.16; Okayama et al. 1997: 256 n. 20).
11. For the description of Bimbisāra’s death in prison and his rebirth as a son of Vaiśravaṇa in
this text, see Gnoli (1977–1978: ii. 159.5-10); trans. Silk (1997: 197).
12. For Buddhaghosa’s account of Bimbisāra’s death and his rebirth as a yakkha attendant of
Vessavaṇa, see Sv 137.21-25; trans. Silk (1997: 204).
13. For the description of Bimbisāra’s death and his rebirth as a son of Vaiśravaṇa in this text,
see T. 1545.360c3-10 (Xuanzang’s trans.); T. 1546.267a4-9 (Buddhavarman’s trans.).
14. See T. 507.775b22-23, which only mentions Bimbisāra’s rebirth in heaven, without specify-
ing whether it is in the heaven of Vaiśravaṇa. T. 507 has been translated in full in Silk (1997:
224–29).
15. See Das and Vidyābhūṣaṇa (1888–1918: i. 1077, verse 24): Vimbisāro ’pi dehānte tasminn eva
kṣaṇe divi | abhūj Jinarṣabho nāma śrīmān Vaiśravaṇātmajaḥ || ‘At the very moment of his death,
Bimbisāra reappeared in heaven as a glorious son of Vaiśravaṇa, named Jinarṣabha.’

All these texts except the *Ajātaśatru-sūtra speak of Bimbisāra’s next birth
in the heaven of Vaiśravaṇa, but none of them mentions his ensuing births,
or when he will attain liberation. In Buddhaghosa’s commentary on the
Sāmaññaphala-sutta, the silence on Bimbisāra’s future spiritual status stands
in stark contrast to a prophecy of Ajātasattu’s eventual paccekabuddha-
hood told later in the commentary. The contrast suggests that Buddhaghosa
was not much concerned with the salvation of the righteous Bimbisāra, pre-
sumably because Bimbisāra has already become a stream-winner and will
consequently attain liberation in the future. Rather, he was very much con-
cerned with the salvation of the patricide Ajātasattu. We now turn to proph-
ecies of Ajātaśatru’s future rebirths given by Buddhaghosa and some other
Buddhist authors, to see how and why they granted awakening and liberation
to this notorious criminal.
Ajātaśatru’s Future Rebirths and Eventual Awakening
In Buddhist traditions, Ajātaśatru is said to have killed his father Bimbisāra

at the instigation of the schismatic Buddhist monk Devadatta, thereby com-
mitting patricide, one of the five ‘crimes of the immediate karmic result
[of descent into hell in the next birth]’ (ānantarya-karmāṇi), the most seri-
ous crimes according to Indian Buddhist ethics.16 Buddhist authors took
different approaches to the salvation of this archetypal criminal. The
Śrāmaṇyaphala-sūtra, the most influential canonical text on the salvation of
Ajātaśatru, relates his visit to the Buddha after the patricide. All the extant
versions of this text, except a Chinese version (T. 22), agree that although
Ajātaśatru is brought to faith by the Buddha through a sermon, he is hindered
by his patricide from making substantial spiritual progress during the ser-
mon.17 The Śrāmaṇyaphala-sūtra, however, does not tell us whether Ajātaśatru
will make spiritual progress in the future after his life in hell, or what spiri-
tual status he could finally reach. These questions are answered in a number
of other Buddhist texts. Below I will introduce three different prophecies of
Ajātaśatru’s future rebirths and his eventual awakening found in Indian Bud-
dhist literature.
In his commentary on the Dīgha-nikāya, the Sumaṅgalavilāsinī, Buddha
ghosa gives an explanation of the term ‘Dhamma-eye’ (dhammacakkhu) used at
16. The five crimes are matricide, patricide, killing an arhat, drawing the blood of a buddha, and
creating a schism in the Buddhist community. For a detailed study, see Silk (2007).
17. T. 22 is the only version of this text which claims that Ajātaśatru achieves a series of spiri-
tual attainments during his visit to the Buddha, including, inter alia, his complete destruc-
tion of outflows (*āsrava), which is equal to the realization of arhatship (cf. 276a13-16). It is
hard to say to what extent T. 22 reflects the contents of its Indic original, especially given
that Ajātaśatru’s arhatship is unattested elsewhere. For more discussions on T. 22, see Mac-
Queen (1988: 224–26); Wu (2012: 98–117).

the end of the Sāmaññaphala-sutta referring to the religious insight Ajātasattu

fails to attain during his visit to the Buddha. There he discusses Ajātasattu’s
future lives as follows:
In other places, this [= the Dhamma-eye] is a designation of three stages [stream-
winning, once-returning, and non-returning], but here it refers only to the stage
of stream-winning. That is to say: ‘If [Ajātasattu] had not killed his father, he
would have attained the stage of stream-winning while sitting here now. How-
ever, due to the association with the evil friend [Devadatta], hindrance arose to
him. Even so, since he took refuge in the Three Jewels after having approached
the Tathāgata, therefore, because of the greatness of my teaching, just as some-
one, after killing another person, could be freed [from the punishment of
murder] through [paying] a penalty of a handful of flowers, in the same way, this
man [Ajātasattu], having been reborn in a copper-pot hell, falling downwards
for thirty thousand years, and having arrived at the lowest level, ascending
upwards for thirty thousand years, and having once again reached the upper-
most level, will be freed.’ This, so they say, was also stated by the Blessed One,
though not included in the canon.18
Now then, having heard this sutta, what benefit has the king [Ajātasattu] gained?
He has gained great benefit. Since the time when his father was killed [by him],
he did not get any sleep, either in the day or in the night. However, after having
approached the Teacher, from the time when he heard this sweet [and] invigorat-
ing discourse on the Dhamma, he got sleep. He paid great honour to the Three
Jewels [i.e., the Buddha, the Dhamma, and the Saṅgha]. Indeed, there was no one
equal to this king in possessing the faith of a worldly person. In the future, more-
over, after becoming a paccekabuddha named Viditavisesa [‘One of Renowned
Distinction’],19 he will attain parinibbāna.20
The passages above address the temporary nature of the karmic retribu-
tion for Ajātasattu’s patricide, and the incredible benefits of his visit to the
Buddha in this life. Besides the immediate psychological effect of restoring
18. Sv 237.24–238.4: aññesu ṭhānesu tiṇṇam maggāṇaṃ etam adhivacanaṃ, idha pana sotāpatti
maggass’ eva. idaṃ vuttaṃ hoti: ‘sace iminā pitā ghātito nābhavissa idāni idh’ eva nisinno sotā-
pattimaggaṃ patto abhavissa. pāpamittasaṃsaggena pan’ assa antarāyo jāto. evaṃ sante pi yasmā
ayaṃ tathāgataṃ upasaṃkamitvā ratanattayaṃ saraṇaṃ gato, tasmā mama sāsanamahantatāya
yathā nāma koci purisavadhaṃ katvā pupphamuṭṭhimattena daṇḍena mucceyya, evam evāyaṃ
lohakumbhiyaṃ nibbattetvā tiṅsa vassasahassāni adho patanto heṭṭhimatalaṃ patvā tiṅsa vassa
sahassāni uddhaṃ uggacchanto puna uparimatalaṃ pāpuṇitvā muccissatīti.’ idam pi kira bhagavatā
vuttam eva, pāḷiyaṃ pana na ārūḷhaṃ. Here pāḷi means ‘original text’ as opposed to aṭṭhakathā
(‘commentary’). It should not be taken to mean the Pāli canon as we now use this term in
English.
19. The Burmese Sixth Council edition gives a different name Vijitāvī [‘Victorious’] (DPG 4:
192.27).
20. Sv 238.5-13: imam pana suttaṃ sutvā rañño ko ānisaṅso laddho? mahā ānisaṅso laddho. ayaṃ hi
pitumāritakālato paṭṭhāya n’ eva rattiṃ na divā niddaṃ labhati. satthāraṃ pana upasaṃkamitvā
imāya madhurāya ojavatiyā dhammadesanāya sutakālato paṭṭhāya niddaṃ labhi. tiṇṇaṃ ratanānaṃ
mahāsakkāraṃ akāsi. pothujjanikāya saddhāya samannāgato nāma iminā raññā sadiso nāma nāhosi.
anāgate pana Viditaviseso nāma paccekabuddho hutvā parinibbāyissatīti. The two passages quoted
here have also been translated and discussed in Miyazaki (2013: 8–10).

his peace of mind, the visit also has two long-term benefits shown in karmic
and spiritual aspects.
First, as a result of his visit to the Buddha and listening to the Buddha’s
sermon, Ajātasattu’s future suffering in hell will be mitigated. Buddhaghosa
tells us that Ajātasattu will be reborn in a copper-pot (lohakumbhī) hell, and
that before being released from there he will sink to the bottom of the hell
over thirty thousand years and then rise to the top over another thirty thou-
sand years. In Pāli literature, a copper-pot hell is a place whose inhabitants
are boiled alive for a long time while being swept up and down repeatedly.21
In his commentary on the Saṃyutta-nikāya, Buddhaghosa tells a story about
four adulterers reborn in a copper-pot hell.22 They are said to spend thirty
thousand years sinking to the bottom of the hell and another thirty thousand
years rising to the top. However, unlike Ajātasattu who will sink and rise only
once before being released, the four have to sink back again immediately after
reaching the top of the hell, thereby undergoing repeated sinking and rising.
Ajātasattu’s exemption from such a repeated process is owing to his visit to
the Buddha in this life; for, as Buddhaghosa says, it is because he takes refuge
in the Three Jewels after approaching the Buddha and ‘through the greatness
of the teaching [of the Buddha]’ (sāsana-mahantatāya) that he will be released
after going up and down only once in the hell. Ajātasattu’s next birth in hell,
therefore, becomes an interface where both the power of karma and the sal-
vific power of the Buddha (and of his teaching) work simultaneously and are,
as it were, in balance.
Second, as Buddhaghosa shows, after his visit to the Buddha Ajātasattu
continues to honour the Three Jewels and gains unparalleled faith, and will
eventually attain parinibbāna after becoming a paccekabuddha. His future lib-
eration is assumed to be the karmic fruit of the honour he has paid and the
faith he has gained in this life, given that Buddhaghosa does not mention any
other good deeds done by him that could lead to such a positive result. Since
both the honour and the faith, in turn, result from his visit to the Buddha, it
is the visit that constitutes the karmic cause of his liberation. Thus his libera-
tion demonstrates the merit of the visit and, ultimately, the salvific power of
the Buddha.
In sum, while the Sāmaññaphala-sutta says that Ajātasattu is hindered by
his own patricide from attaining the Dhamma-eye during his visit to the
Buddha, in his commentary Buddhaghosa shows that this hindrance is only
temporary, and that the visit itself has long-reaching benefits. By doing so, he
21. For descriptions of torments in such a hell, see, for instance, Sn 129.11-14 [verse 670] (trans.
K. R. Norman 2001: 88) and AN I 141.20-27 (trans. Woodward 1932: 124).
22. See Spk I 142.10-20; trans. Wu (2012: 153). This story is also recounted, with some variation,
in the paccuppannavatthu (‘story of the present’) and atītavatthu (‘story of the past’) of No.
314 Lohakumbhi-jātaka (Ja III 43.15-27 and 46.19-47.15; trans. Cowell 1895–1907: iii. 29, 31–
32), and in the Dhp-a (II 5.13-6.4 and 10.7–11.16; trans. Burlingame 1921: ii. 103, 106–107).
See also a discussion on this story in von Hinüber (1998: 147–48).

shifts the emphasis from the restraints caused by Ajātasattu’s bad karma to
the salvific power of the Buddha and of his teaching.
Another prophecy of Ajātaśatru’s future rebirths and pratyekabuddhahood
appears in a sūtra collected in the Chinese translation of the Ekottarikāgama
(T. 125 [38.11]).23 There, the Buddha asks an envoy from Vaiśālī to convey the
following prophecy to King Ajātaśatru:
Do not be afraid. Now you go to the king’s place and tell him this: ‘…Your father,
the king [Bimbisāra], is innocent but you put him to death. You are supposed to
be reborn in the Avīci hell, to experience one kalpa [there]. However, now since
you have abandoned this crime, rectified your past transgression24 and achieved
the faculty of faith (śraddhendriya?) in the Dharma of the Tathāgata, because of
this basis of virtue (kuśalamūla?), your crime is eliminated forever without residue.
When you finish this life, you will be reborn in a bouncing-ball hell.25 When you
finish your life there, you will be reborn above among the Four Heavenly Kings.
When you finish your life there, you will be reborn above in the Yāma Heaven.
When you finish your life in the Yāma heaven, you will be reborn in the Tuṣita
Heaven, in the Nirmāṇarati Heaven, in the Paranirmitavaśavartin Heaven. Then
you will return in sequence [through these heavens] to the Four Heavenly Kings.
Great King, you should know that throughout twenty kalpas you will never fall
into the evil destinies and will always be reborn among gods and humans. In your
final birth, due to your firm faith, you will have your hair and beard shaved, and
put on the monastic robe [consisting of] three parts. You will go forth from house-
hold into homelessness to learn the [Buddhist] path, and will be named “Pratyeka
buddha Free of Evil”…’26
According to this prophecy, Ajātaśatru is supposed to be reborn in the Avīci

hell for one kalpa in consequence of his patricide, but now, because of his rec-
tification (or repentance?) of his crime and his acquisition of faith in the Bud-
dhist Dharma, he will only be reborn in a bouncing-ball hell. Whatever the
punishment typical of this kind of hell may be, it is without doubt less griev-
ous than that of the Avīci hell. The point of this prophecy is clear: although
Ajātaśatru has committed the worst crime in this life and thereby incurred
extreme punishment in his next life, it is still possible for him to mitigate
the karmic consequence of his crime through gaining faith in the Buddhist
Dharma.
As the text also shows, after his release from hell Ajātaśatru will be con-
tinuously reborn in the heavens and then attain pratyekabuddhahood. Such a
prophecy of continuous heavenly rebirths leading to eventual awakening is a
common narrative device in Buddhist literature.27 Here it is used to illustrate
23. The reference number T. 125 [38.11] means that this is the eleventh sūtra collected in the
thirty-eighth chapter of the Chinese Ekottarikāgama (T. 125).
24. This is a literal translation of the Chinese 改其過罪. As it is impossible for Ajātaśatru actu-
ally to rectify his killing of his father, the text must be referring to his repentance.
25. The text gives the hell name as 拍毬地獄 which does not seem to be attested elsewhere.
26. T. 125. 726a7-16; partially trans. in Radich (2011: 79 n. 298).
27. For instance, in the Aśokavarṇāvadāna (Divyāvadāna 11), the Buddha makes a similar

the incredible karmic rewards for Ajātaśatru’s faith in the Buddhist Dharma.
As the text does not mention any effort made by Ajātaśatru himself, we may
assume that it is the Buddha who brings about faith in Ajātaśatru, and the
faith in turn bears karmic fruit in his future lives. Thus in T. 125 [38.11] the
mitigation of Ajātaśatru’s suffering in hell, his continuous heavenly rebirths
and his final awakening all demonstrate the salvific power of the Buddha and
of what he taught.
Almost the same prophecy appears in another freestanding Chinese text
(T. 508).28 Moreover, in Kṣemendra’s Ajātaśatrupitṛdrohāvadāna Ajātaśatru
repents of his patricide and visits the Buddha, who then delivers a sermon on
karma to him and predicts his eventual pratyekabuddhahood.29 As the entire
Ajātaśatrupitṛdrohāvadāna deserves a separate and detailed treatment, I will
not discuss it here. Rather, I would like to look at a prophecy of Ajātaśatru’s
eventual buddhahood told in the *Ajātaśatrukaukṛtyavinodana (‘Dispelling of
the Remorse of Ajātaśatru’; AjKV), one of the first Mahāyāna sūtras translated
into Chinese in the late second century ce.30
The AjKV centres on the story that the Bodhisattva Mañjuśrī successfully
dispels Ajātaśatru’s remorse for his patricide through convincing him of the
ultimate emptiness (śūnyatā) of all phenomena including the worst deeds
such as the ānantarya crimes and their retributions. The text shows a strong
inclination to construct and exalt the authority of Mañjuśrī, and hence to
demonstrate the superiority of the bodhisattva path exemplified by him. The
prophecy of Ajātaśatru’s buddhahood appears in the later part of the AjKV,
where the Buddha discusses with his disciple Śāriputra Ajātaśatru’s past and
future lives. Since the Chinese translation T. 626 produced by Lokakṣema in
the late second-century ce is the oldest extant witness to an Indian recen-
sion of the AjKV, my translation below is made from Lokakṣema’s version.31 I
prophecy regarding a bull (Cowell and Neil 1886: 140.5–141.2). In the Śukapotakāvadāna
(Divyāvadāna 16), the Buddha makes such a prophecy regarding two parrots (Cowell and
Neil 1886: 200.5-17). In the Chinese Ekottarikāgama, this kind of prophecy appears four
times, referring to Ajātaśatru (T. 125 [38. 11]), two householders (T. 125 [35.7]. 700b16-24; T.
125 [40.5]. 740a10-17), and Devadatta (T. 125 [49.9]. 804c4-13).
28. This prophecy (T. 508. 776a1-b17) has been translated and discussed in Wu (2012: 157–78).
29. In this text, the Buddha says to Ajātaśatru (Das and Vidyābhūṣaṇa 1888–1918: i. 1083, verse
46): pratyekabuddhas tvaṃ rājan kālena kṣīṇakilviṣaḥ | bhaviṣyasi vivekena kṛtālokaḥ śanaiḥ
śanaiḥ || ‘O King, your crime will be extinguished in due time. Gradually, gradually, you
will become a pratyekabuddha, enlightened in solitude (or “through intellectual discrimina-
tion”?).’
30. I follow Miyazaki (2012) in giving this Sanskrit title. As Miyazaki rightly points out, this
title is not attested in any extant Indic-language source (p. 25). Based on a survey of Ti-
betan transliterations of the title in various Kanjur editions, relevant Chinese translations,
and references to the AjKV in other Mahāyāna texts, he suggests two possible titles under
which the AjKV may have circulated in ancient India: *Ajātaśatrukaukṛtya(prati)vinodana
and *Ajātaśatru-parivarta/-sūtra (p. 31).
31. T. 626 has been translated in full into Japanese by Sadakata (1989).

include in footnotes the counterparts in the fragmentary Sanskrit version of

this text recently found in the Schøyen Collection, along with my translation
of them.32 The Buddha’s discussion with Śāriputra runs as follows:
At that time, Śāriputra asked the Buddha, ‘How much is Ajātaśatru’s remaining
crime?’ The Buddha said, ‘The Dharma he heard is like a mustard seed [in amount],
[but] it can eliminate a crime [as huge as] Mount Sumeru.’ Śāriputra asked the
Buddha, ‘Will King Ajātaśatru enter hell?’ [The Buddha said,] ‘It is just as a deity
of the Heaven of the Thirty-three gods, wearing numerous precious jewels,
descends here and then immediately ascends back to his abode. Ajātaśatru will
also, adorned with [good] clothes and jewels, just like that deity, descend from
above. Although he will enter hell—the hell is called Piṇḍa[?]33—after entering it,
he will experience no pain, and then, he will be like that deity ascending back to
his original abode.’ Śāriputra said to the Buddha, ‘It is excellent that Ajātaśatru’s
crime has been diminished.’34
The Buddha goes on to relate Ajātaśatru’s past lives, during which he was in-
spired by Mañjuśrī to conceive the aspiration for supreme and perfect awak-
ening (anuttarasamyaksaṃbodhicitta). The Buddha then predicts that Ajātaśatru
will subsequently be released from hell and meet Mañjuśrī again in heaven. He
says:
Now Ajātaśatru, although entering hell, will rise up and be reborn in the heaven
above, five hundred and forty-five [buddha-]fields away from here, [in a buddha-
field] named *Vyūha where the Buddha is named *Ratnaketu. There he will once
again encounter Mañjuśrī. In that field, he will hear from [Mañjuśrī] an exposition
of the Dharma, and will then attain acceptance of the fact that all dharmas [i.e.,
states of existence] are unoriginated.35
32. For the counterparts in the Tibetan version of the AjKV and an English translation of the
Tibetan, see Harrison and Hartmann (2000: 204–212).
33. The text has bīntóu 賓頭. According to Pulleyblank (1991), its Early Middle Chinese pronun-
ciation may be reconstructed as pjin-dəw.
34. T. 626. 404a14-22. The Sanskrit reads (Harrison and Hartmann 2000: 204, folio 543r1-v1):
(r1) gaṃbhīrān dharmadeśanām āgamya kṣīṇaṃ vipariṇataṃ anutpādadharmam iti (…r2) deveṣu
trayastṛṃśeṣu devaputraḥ divye ratnamaye kūṭāgāre nil(ayana…r3) upapatsyati | utkramati ca | na
cāsya kāye duḥkhasya vedanā a(…v1) avedanīyaṃ kṛtaṃ | ‘[The Buddha said,] “…having entered
into this profound Dharma-discourse, [Ajātaśatru’s crime] is diminished, changed, and has
the quality of non-arising.”… [The Buddha said,] “…among the Thirty-three gods, a deity
abiding in a divine pavilion made of jewels…will descend to…and [will] rise up, and he [will
experience] no feeling of pain in his body…” [Śāriputra said to the Buddha,] “…is rendered
unable to be felt”.’
35. T. 626. 404b5-9. The Sanskrit reads (Harrison and Hartmann 2000: 208, folio 544r2-r4):
(r2…) eṣa śāriputra rājā ajātaśatruḥ tataḥ piṇḍorīye mahānarakād udgamya ūrdhvadiśābhāge
upapatsyate ito buddhakṣetrāc catuścatvāriṃśad buddhakṣetraśa(tāni…r3…) nāma tathāgato
’rhān saṃmyaksaṃbuddhaḥ etarhi dharmaṃ deśeti <|> eṣa tatra kṣetre upapannaḥ punar eva
maṃjuśriyaṃ kumārabhūtaṃ drakṣyati imāṃ ca gaṃbhīrāṃ dharmad(e)ś(anāṃ ś)r(oṣyati…
r4…anutpattikeṣu ca dharme)ṣu kṣāntiṃ pratilapsyate | ‘Śāriputra, this king Ajātaśatru,
then, having arisen from the great hell Piṇḍori/Piṇḍorī, will be reborn in the region
above, forty-four hundred buddha-fields away from this buddha-field…, a tathāgata, arhat,
perfectly-awakened one called…, teaches the Dharma at that time. Reborn there in that

The Buddha further predicts that Ajātaśatru will later be reborn as a bodhi
sattva in this world. In describing Ajātaśatru’s eventual buddhahood, he says:
This king Ajātaśatru, after the aforementioned eight innumerable kalpas, will
become a buddha. That kalpa will be named *Priyadarśana and the [buddha‑]field
named *Akardama. The Tathāgata [= Ajātaśatru] will be named *Viśuddhaviṣaya.
At that time, his lifespan will be four small kalpas… After the Buddha [= Ajātaśatru]
passes into parinirvāṇa, his Dharma will abide for millions of years and will not
perish until afterwards…36
The Buddha’s statements above provide us with a picture of Ajātaśatru’s path

towards supreme awakening, which starts from his past lives and culminates
in his final life. During this process, Mañjuśrī plays a crucial role, initiating
Ajātaśatru to conceive the aspiration for awakening, and then guiding him
over multiple lifetimes towards the realization of awakening. Such a portrayal
of Mañjuśrī as a life-transcending guide who brings even the worst criminal to
perfect awakening is consistent with the overall goal of the AjKV to construct
the authority of this archetypal bodhisattva. Thus in the AjKV Ajātaśatru’s
buddhahood demonstrates the salvific capability of Mañjuśrī and, ultimately,
the worthiness of the bodhisattva path which he exemplifies.
The AjKV also tells us that, due to his understanding of Mañjuśrī’s dis-
course on emptiness, Ajātaśatru’s patricide is almost totally erased: although
he will still fall into hell, he will quickly get out and suffer no pain. By claim-
ing that even this gravest of crimes can be cleansed through a realization of
the doctrine of emptiness, the authors of the AjKV almost entirely annihi-
lated the power of karma through an exaltation of the purifying efficacy of
the Buddhist Dharma.37
We have now seen three different prophecies of Ajātaśatru’s eventual
liberation. The most important reason why the Buddhist authors of these
prophecies had Ajātaśatru saved, it seems to me, is this: as an ānantarya crimi-
nal, Ajātaśatru represents one of the worst-case scenarios in Indian Buddhist
ethics, and was often considered, at least by traditional non-Mahāyāna Bud-
field, he will meet Prince Mañjuśrī again and hear this profound Dharma-discourse…
And he will attain receptivity [into unoriginated dharmas].’
36. T. 626. 404b20-28. The Sanskrit reads (Harrison and Hartmann 2000: 211, folio 545r2-v1):
sa eṣa śāriputra rājā ajātaśatruḥ aṣṭabhir asaṃkhyeyakalpebhiḥ anuttarāṃ saṃmyaksaṃbodhim
abhisaṃbotsyate <|> pṛyadarśane kalpe (…r3…ta)thāgato ’rh<ān> saṃmyaksaṃbuddho loke
bhaviṣyati | catvāriṃśac cāsya kalpā āyuṣpramāṇaṃ bhaviṣyati <|>...<|> parinirvṛtasya ca
paripūrṇaṃ varṣak(oṭiṃ) s(ad)dh(arma…v1…), ‘Śāriputra, this king Ajātaśatru, after eight in-
numerable kalpas, will awaken fully to supreme and perfect awakening. He will become
a tathāgata, an arhat, a perfectly-awakened one…in the world, in the kalpa [named]
Pṛyadarśana… And his lifespan will be forty kalpas… After he has undergone parinirvāṇa,
when a period of a koṭi of years has been completed, the true Dharma…’
37. The AjKV is not unique in proclaiming the purifying efficacy of the doctrine of emptiness.
See Granoff (2012: 204 n. 60), for similar proclamations in the Tathāgatakoṣa-sūtra and the
Karmāvaraṇaviśuddhi-sūtra cited by the eighth-century Indian Buddhist scholar Śāntideva
in his Śikṣāsamuccaya.

dhists, to have been hindered by his patricide from achieving spiritual attain-
ment in this life.38 Through granting ultimate awakening and liberation to
this seemingly unsavable criminal, the Buddhist authors demonstrated the
temporary nature of the obstacle to spiritual growth caused by moral culpa-
bility, the salvific capability of the Buddha (or a bodhisattva such as Mañjuśrī),
the efficacy of the Buddhist Dharma, and the overwhelmingly positive nature
of Buddhist soteriology. In contrast to those Buddhist authors who claimed
Ajātaśatru’s future liberation, Jaina authors seem to have shown no interest
in granting liberation to this figure. It is to the Jaina accounts of Kūṇika’s
death and his ensuing destiny that we now turn.
Future Rebirths of Śreṇika and Kūṇika in Jaina Sources
Kūṇika’s Death and Next Birth in Hell
The Jainas spoke of Śreṇika’s suicide instead of Kūṇika’s patricide. According

to the Nirayāvaliyāo (Skt. Nirayāvalikā, ‘Series of Hells’), the eighth Upāṅga of
the Śvetāmbara canon, for the sake of the throne Kūṇika throws his father
Śreṇika into prison, where Śreṇika dies through suicide (Deleu 1969: 104.28–
107.5, §§13-14; trans. de Jong and Wiles 1996: 45–47). The Nirayāvaliyāo also
contains a description of Kūṇika’s war against Ceṭaka of Vaiśālī, in which
Kūṇika survives the war but his ten brothers all fight to the death and go to
hell (Deleu 1969: 109.31–11.34, 113, §§18–22; trans. de Jong and Wiles 1996:
49–53). In the Viyāhapannatti (Skt. Vyākhyāprajñapti, ‘Exposition of Explana-
tions’), the fifth Aṅga, Mahāvīra narrates two great wars between Kūṇika and
chiefs of other tribes, during which Kūṇika is said to have hurt or killed all the
great warriors of his adversaries.39 Since Jainism holds that the intentional
killing of any living being leads to the fate of hell, even though Kūṇika is not
considered a patricide in Jaina traditions, given his military violence he still
has to go to hell.
38. According to AN III 436.17-26 (trans. Hare 1934: 305), an ānantarya criminal is unable to
enter the ‘determined state that is rightness’ (sammattam niyāmam). Buddhaghosa explains
(Spk II 346.18-19): okkanto sammatta-niyāman ti, paviṭṭho ariyamaggaṃ, ‘“One who enters the
determined state of rightness” refers to one who has got into the path of noble ones’. The in-
ability of an ānantarya criminal to get on the noble path to liberation is also addressed in the
Sarvāstivāda Abhidharmakośabhāṣya ad IV.96 (Pradhan 1967: 259.8-9, 14–15): pañcānantaryāṇi
karmāvaraṇam | tadyathā mātṛvadhaḥ pitṛvadho ’rhadvadhaḥ saṃghabhedaḥ tathāgataśarīre
duṣṭacittarudhirotpādanam |…| kasyaitāny āvaraṇāni | āryamārgasya āryamārgaprāyogikāṇāṃ ca
kuśalamūlānām, ‘The obstacle of karma refers to the five crimes of immediate retribution,
namely, matricide, patricide, killing an arhat, creating a schism, and drawing the blood in
the body of a Tathāgata with evil intent… To what do they constitute obstacles? [They are
obstacles] to the path of noble ones, and to the wholesome roots that are preparatory to
the path of noble ones’; also trans. in La Vallée Poussin (1923–1931: iii. 201, 203).
39. For the Prākrit text and a translation of Mahāvīra’s narration, see Lalwani (1973–1985: iii.
66-79); see also a summary in Deleu (1970: 140–42).

At least five post-canonical Śvetāmbara texts give accounts of Kūṇika’s

death and his rebirth in hell. Two are cuṇṇis (Skt. cūrṇi) or Prākrit prose com-
mentaries on the canonical Dasaveyāliya-sutta (Skt. Daśavaikālika-sūtra, ‘Dis-
course on Ten Evening Treatises’): the Dasaveyāliya-cuṇṇi (DasCA) ascribed to
Agastyasiṃha (fifth century ce) and the Dasaveyāliya-cuṇṇi (DasCJ) ascribed to
Jinadāsa (sixth–seventh centuries ce).40 The others are the Āvassaya-cuṇṇi (Skt.
Āvaśyaka-cūrṇi; ĀvC) also attributed to Jinadāsa,41 the Āvaśyaka-ṭīkā (ĀvṬ) by
Haribhadra (eighth century ce),42 and the Triṣaṣṭiśalākāpuruṣacarita (‘Lives of
Sixty-three Illustrious Persons’) written by Hemacandra (eleventh–twelfth
centuries ce). In the ĀvC, Haribhadra’s ĀvṬ and Hemacandra’s work, the
death of Kūṇika occurs immediately after his war against Ceṭaka. Given this
sequence, Kūṇika’s rebirth in hell may be seen as the karmic retribution for
his military violence. The accounts in the ĀvC and in Haribhadra’s ĀvṬ are
basically the same. Since the narrative material in the ĀvC is usually consid-
ered to be older, I translate its account here:
At that time, Kūṇika returned to Campā. The Svāmin stopped [at a holy assem-
bly] there. Then Kūṇika thought, ‘I have many elephants and horses. Now I go
and ask the Svāmin, “Am I a cakravartin [‘wheel-turning king’] or not?”’ He went
out in all pomp [to the holy assembly]. Having venerated [the Svāmin], he said,
‘How many cakravartins are in the future?’ The Svāmin said, ‘[The cakravartins]
all passed away.’ He further asked, ‘Where will I be reborn?’ [The Svāmin said,]
‘In the sixth hell.’43 Even so, unbelieving, having had all the single-sensed
jewels made of copper produced, 44 [Kūṇika] went to Timisraguhā [which was
40. The Daśavaikālika-sūtra is one of the four mūlasūtras (‘basic scriptures’) of the
Śvetāmbara canon. Its oldest commentary is the versified Daśavaikālika-niryukti in
Prākrit. Both cūrṇis are Prākrit prose commentaries that expound the niryukti. On the
date of Agastyasiṃha, see Dundas (2002: 72, 336); on the date of Jinadāsa (ca. 593–693
ce), see Balbir (1993: 81). While Ānandasāgara Sūri has attributed the authorship of
DasCJ to Jinadāsa in his preface to this text, such an attribution has not been substanti-
ated (see Kapadia 1941: 193-94).
41. The ĀvC is a Prākrit prose commentary on the Āvassaya-nijjutti (Skt. Āvaśyaka-niryukti; ĀvN)
which itself is a Prākrit verse commentary on the canonical Āvassaya-sutta (Skt. Āvaśyaka-sūtra,
‘Discourse on Obligatory Duties’), one of the four mūlasūtras of the Śvetāmbara canon. Al-
though the ĀvC is traditionally attributed to Jinadāsa, the text itself makes no mention of its
own authorship (Kapadia 1941: 192; Balbir 1993: 81).
42. This is also a prose commentary on the ĀvN, written in mixed Prākrit and Sanskrit.
43. According to Jaina cosmology, there are seven hells in the lower realm, one below another
(for more details, see Wiley 2004: 23, s.v. adho-loka).
44. The text reads savvāṇi egiṃdiyāṇi lohamayāṇi rayaṇāṇi karettā. In Jainism, copper is consid-
ered a single-sensed (ekendriya) elemental being (Schubring 1935: 134 (§105); 1962: 208).
Each cakravartin is said to have seven single-sensed jewels and seven five-sensed (pañcen-
driya) jewels. See Ṭhāṇ VII, sutta 558 (Jambūvijaya 2002–2003: iii. 682.22–83.2): egamegassa
ṇaṃ ranno cāuraṃtacakkavaṭṭissa satta egiṃdiyarataṇā pannattā, taṃ jahā—cakkarataṇe, chat
tarayaṇe, cammarayaṇe, daṃḍarataṇe, asirataṇe, maṇirayaṇe, kākaṇirataṇe | egamegassa ṇaṃ
ranno cāuraṃtacakkavaṭṭissa satta paṃceṃdiyarataṇā pannattā, taṃjahā—seṇāvatīrataṇe, gāhā
vatirataṇe, vaḍḍhatirayaṇe, purohitarayaṇe, itthirataṇe, āsarataṇe, hatthirayaṇe | ‘For each

a cave of Mount Vaitāḍhya] in all pomp. After having taken the eighth meal, 45
[the presiding deity] Kṛtamālaka said [to Kūṇika], ‘The cakravartins were all
gone. Go away!’ [Kūṇika] did not want [to leave]. He fastened [his riding-] ele-
phant. Having put his [crown] jewel on the head of the elephant, he went forth
[to strike the door of Kṛtamālaka?]. 46 He was killed by Kṛtamālaka and died,
going to the sixth hell. 47
The text goes on to narrate the ascension of Kūṇika’s son Udāyin to the
throne, without saying anything more about Kūṇika. In his commentary on
the Dasaveyāliya-sutta, Agastyasiṃha gives a slightly different version of this
episode:
Kūṇika asked the Svāmin, ‘Where do the cakravartins who have not abandoned
the fulfilment of sensual desires go after finishing their lives [in this world]?’ The
Svāmin said, ‘[They are reborn] in the seventh hell.’ [Kūṇika] said, ‘Where will I be
reborn?’ The Svāmin said, ‘In the sixth hell.’ He said, ‘Why can’t I be reborn in the
seventh?’ The Svāmin said, ‘A cakravartin goes to the seventh.’ He said, ‘Am I not
a cakravartin? I also have eighty-four hundred thousand elephants.’ The Svāmin
said, ‘Do you have the jewels [of a cakravartin]?’ Having had the artificial jewels
made, [Kūṇika] started to accomplish [his ambition?].48 He set out to enter into
Timisraguhā. [There] he was stopped by Kṛtamālaka. [Kṛtamālaka] said [to him],
‘The twelve cakravartins are all gone.49 [Go away; otherwise] you will vanish.’ He
wheel-turning king of the four quarters [of the land of Bharata], seven single-sensed
jewels were provided, namely, a wheel-jewel, a parasol-jewel, a fleece-jewel, a stick-jewel,
a sword-jewel, a crown-jewel, and a jewel of the “prototype of all measures of capacity”
(on this rendition of kākaṇi [var. kāgiṇī], see Schubring 1935: 19 (§13); 1962: 21). For each
wheel-turning king of the four quarters [of the land of Bharata], seven five-sensed jewels
were provided, namely, a commander-in-chief-jewel, a chamberlain-jewel, an architect-
jewel, a domestic-chaplain-jewel, a woman-jewel, a horse-jewel, and an elephant-jewel’).
The present text seems to mean that Kūṇika orders all the seven single-sensed jewels
belonging to a cakravartin to be made in copper.
45. The text has aṭṭhame bhatte kate. On aṭṭhama-bhattiya (< *aṣṭama-bhaktika) referring to
one who refuses to take food until the eighth meal (that is, one who fasts 3½ days), see
Schubring (1935: 174 (§156); 1962: 276).
46. Haribhadra’s ĀvṬ has daṃḍeṇa duvāraṃ āhaṇai (‘He struck the door [of Kṛtamālaka] with a
staff’).
47. ĀvC ii.176.11–77.2: tāhe kūṇiko caṃpam āgato. tattha sāmī samosaḍho. tāhe kūṇiko ciṃteti:
bahugā mama hatthī assā vi. to jāmi sāmiṃ pucchāmi: ahaṃ cakkavaṭṭī homi na homi tti? nig-
gato savvabalasamudaeṇaṃ. vaṃdittā bhaṇati: kevaiyā cakkavaṭṭī essā? sāmī sāhati: savve atītā.
puṇo bhaṇati: kahiṃ ovajjissāmi? chaṭṭhīe puḍhavīe. taha vi asaddahaṃto savvāṇi egiṃdiyāṇi
lohamayāṇi rayaṇāṇi karettā tāhe savvabalena timisaguhaṃ gato. aṭṭhame bhatte kate bhaṇati
katamālao: atītā cakkavaṭṭiṇo, jāhi tti. ṇecchati. hatthiṃ vilaggo. maṇiṃ hatthimatthae kātūṇa pat-
thito. katamālaeṇa āhato mato, chaṭṭhīe puḍhavīe gato. See also a parallel in Haribhadra’s ĀvṬ
687b1-6. For convenience, I have Sanskritized all the Prākrit names. My Sanskrit render-
ings follow Mehta and Chandra (1970–72).
48. The text has oyaveum āraddho. I follow Ratnachandraji (1923–1932: ii. 349, s.v. oyava [<
√sādh]) to translate oyaveum as ‘to accomplish’; āraddha < ārabdha (‘begun’). This phrase
may refer to Kūṇika’s attempt at further military conquest.
49. The text has volīṇā cakkavaṭṭī vārasa vi, where cakkavaṭṭī = cakkavaṭṭiṇo (nom. pl.)..

was not [held back and still] stayed there.50 [Then] he was killed by Kṛtamālaka and
went to the sixth hell.51
In both versions, Kūṇika is portrayed in a negative light. Overwhelmed by

egotism, he disbelieves Mahāvīra’s words and considers himself a cakravartin.
Eventually, he is killed by Kṛtamālaka and goes to the sixth hell as Mahāvīra
predicts. According to the Jaina Universal History, there were twelve cakra-
vartins altogether: three renounced the world and became tīrthaṅkaras; seven
abandoned their thrones and became Jaina monks, among whom some
attained liberation and the others were reborn in heaven; the remaining two
(Subhūma and Brahmadatta), due to their unrighteousness, went to the sev-
enth (and worst) hell, and there is no mention of their ultimate liberation
(Jaini 1993: 209–10). In the present episode, through comparing Kūṇika with
the two bad cakravartins, not with the ten good ones, Agastyasiṃha appar-
ently classifies him as a villainous tyrant ending up in ruination, rather than
a virtuous hero who is to attain liberation.
Hemacandra retells this episode in more detail in his Triṣaṣṭiśalākāpuruṣa
carita, where he also keeps silent on what happens to Kūṇika after his descent
into hell.52 I have not found any account about Kūṇika’s future destiny in
extant Jaina literature. While this does not mean that such an account has
never been composed, it does seem that Jaina authors in general showed
much less interest in the salvation of Kūṇika than in that of his father Śreṇika
who, as we will see, is prophesied to become the first future tīrthaṅkara in both
Śvetāmbara and Digambara traditions.
Śreṇika’s Future Rebirths and Eventual Tīrthaṅkarahood
The earliest extant Śvetāmbara source that contains detailed information on

Śreṇika’s eventual liberation is the third Aṅga, the Ṭhāṇaṅga (Skt. Sthānāṅga,
‘On Various Points [of the Teaching]’; Ṭhāṇ).53 There, Mahāvīra makes a proph-
50. The text has ṇa ṭhāti (‘He did not stay’) which does not make sense in the present context.
The corresponding passage in DasCJ reads vārijjaṃto na ṭhāi ya (‘He was not held back and
[still] stayed [there]’).
51. DasCA 26.1-6: kūṇieṇa sāmī pucchito: cakkavaṭṭiṇo aparicattakāmabhogā kālaṃ kiccā kahiṃ
gacchaṃti? sāmī bhaṇati: sattamīe puḍhavīe | so bhaṇati: ahaṃ kahiṃ uvavajjīhāmi? sāmiṇā
bhaṇiyaṃ: chaṭṭhapuḍhavīe | so bhaṇati: ahaṃ sattamīe kiṃ na uvavajjāmi? | sāmī bhaṇati: sattamiṃ
cakkavaṭṭī gacchati | bhaṇati: ahaṃ kiṃ na cakkavaṭṭī? mama vi caurāsītiṃ daṃtisayasahassā | sāmī
bhaṇati: tava kiṃ rayaṇā atthi? | so kittimāṇi rayaṇāṇi kāravettā oyaveum āraddho | timisaguhaṃ
pavisium āraddho kayamālaeṇa vārito: volīṇā cakkavaṭṭī vārasa vi, tumaṃ viṇassihisi | ṇa ṭhāti |
kayamālaeṇa hato chaṭṭhiṃ gato || Basically the same passage, with some differences in word-
ing, appears in DasCJ (51.4-9).
52. Śāha (1977: 379–80, verses 403–25); trans. Johnson (1931–1962: vi. 331–33).
53. The most thorough study to date of the Jaina future tīrthaṅkaras is Balbir (1991), which in-
cludes an informative list of Śvetāmbara and Digambara sources on Śreṇika’s tīrthaṅkara
hood (see p. 64 n. 54).

ecy of Śreṇika’s next birth in hell and his following birth as a jina (‘victorious
one’). In describing Śreṇika’s existence in hell, Mahāvīra says to his disciples:
O Noble Ones! This king Śreṇika Bhimbhisāra, at the time of his death, having
finished his life, will be reborn as a hell-being among hell-beings in the enclosed
hell, in the Ratnaprabhā infernal world [i.e., the first hell], with the duration of
eighty-four thousand years in the hell… Then, after rising from the hell, in the
coming ascending age, 54 exactly here, in the land of Bharata in the continent of
Jambudvīpa, in the country of the Puṇḍras, in the city of Śatadvāra at the foot
of Mount Vaitāḍhya, he will take birth as a male in the womb of the wife Bhadrā
of the patriarch Sammuci. 55
Mahāvīra goes on to describe the birth of the child, the ceremony of naming
him Mahāpadma, his coronation as king, his renunciation and ascetic career.
After this, Mahāvīra says:
Then [Mahāpadma] will become a blessed one, an arhat, a victorious one, an omni-
scient one, an all-knowing one, an all-seeing one, who knows and observes the
mode of the world of gods, humans and asuras.56
The Ṭhāṇaṅga does not explain why Śreṇika will go to hell, or why he will
eventually become a jina. In the Āvaśyaka-niryukti, an early Prākrit versified
commentary on the canonical Āvaśyaka-sūtra, we find the following verse
mentioning Śreṇika’s future jinahood in relation to his adoption of the ‘best
view’ (Pkt. varaṃ daṃsaṇaṃ) in this life:
At that time, Śreṇika was not well-learnt. He did not even know the [Vyākhyā-]
prajñapti, and was not a connoisseur of the Pūrvas. [However,] having thoroughly
considered none other than the best view [of reality] with his wisdom, he will
become a jina in the future.57
54. According to Jaina cosmology, in karma-bhūmis (‘realms of action’, i.e., places where jina-
hood can be attained) time moves on endlessly in cycles. Each cycle comprises an ascend-
ing half (utsarpiṇī) and a descending half (avasarpiṇī). During each half-cycle, twenty-four
tīrthaṅkaras appear in succession in the land of Bharata. In the present half-cycle, which is
an avasarpiṇī, Ṛṣabha is the first tīrthaṅkara and Mahāvīra is the last. Both Śvetāmbaras and
Digambaras agree that Śreṇika will become the first tīrthaṅkara of the coming utsarpiṇī. For
more on Jaina conceptions of time, see Schubring (1935: 144–45 (§§119–20); 1962: 225–27);
Jaini (1979: 29–34).
55. Ṭhāṇ IX, sutta 693 (Jambūvijaya 2002–2003: iii. 789.22-24, 790.3-5): esa ṇaṃ ajjo seṇie rāyā
bhiṃbhisāre kālamāse kālaṃ kiccā imīse rataṇappabhāte puḍhavīte sīmaṃtate narae caurāsīti
vāsasahassaṭṭhitīyaṃsi nirayaṃsi neraiesu ṇeraiyattāe uvavajjihiti…se ṇaṃ tato naratāto
uvvaṭṭettā āgamesāte ussappiṇīte iheva jaṃbuddīve dīve bharahe vāse veyaḍḍhagiripāyamūle
puṃḍesu jaṇavatesu sataduvāre ṇagare saṃmuissa kulakarassa bhaddāe bhāriyāe kucchiṃsi
pumattāe paccāyāhitī.
56. Ṭhāṇ IX, sutta 693 (Jambūvijaya 2002–2003: iii. 792.11-12): tae ṇaṃ se bhagavaṃ arahā jiṇe
bhavissati, kevalī savvannū savvadarisī sadevamaṇuyāsurassa logassa pariyāgaṃ jāṇai pāsai.
57. The ĀvN has a complex textual history. Leumann (1934: 29b–31b) has differentiated four
redactions of the ĀvN based on its extant manuscripts and commentaries. Balbir (1993:
45) has pointed out that ‘la vulgate de l’ĀvN n’est pas constituée par les manuscrits du
texte, mais par ses commentateurs…on tient pour vulgate la niryukti commentée par

The ĀvC and Haribhadra’s ĀvṬ, two prose commentaries on the Āvaśyaka-
niryukti, do not mention Śreṇika’s future jinahood (Balbir 1991: 42). In both
texts, we find an exchange between Mahāvīra and Śreṇika regarding the lat-
ter’s next birth in hell:
The Blessed One said [to King Śreṇika], ‘…As long as you live, you enjoy happiness.
When you die, you will go to hell.’ Śreṇika said to the Svāmin, ‘O Blessed One, with
you as my lord,58 why shall I go to hell? By what means could I not go to hell?’ The
Svāmin said, ‘If you can make the butcher Kāla give up killing, if you can make the
Brahmin woman Kapilā give alms [to Jaina monks], then you will not go to hell…’59
Śreṇika then goes on to urge Kāla to abandon killing and Kapilā to donate,
but he fails in both cases. His failure suggests that the karmic law cannot be
avoided by any means.
In the Maṇipaticarita (‘Career of King Maṇipati’), we find another version
of this story, where Mahāvīra explains to Śreṇika that his next birth in hell is
temporary, and that he will attain tīrthaṅkarahood after rising from hell. The
passage below is cited from the oldest known version of the Maṇipaticarita,
which dates probably from the eighth century ce:
Having heard this [namely, Mahāvīra’s prophecy of his next birth in hell], the
king’s heart was filled with sorrow. He said [to Mahāvīra], ‘With you as my lord,
will I go to hell?’ The Blessed One said to the king, ‘You had previously been bound
with a lifespan in hell, nor am I your lord; therefore, abandon infirmity of will.
Wipe away tears, Śreṇika! As one who upholds the pure right view, after rising
from hell, here in the land of Bharata, in the ascending age, you will become the
first tīrthaṅkara, the Lord Śrīpadma.’ At these words, he horripilated [with joy],
like a dhārā-kadamba tree in the rain falling from clouds. Having once again wor-
shipped the Blessed One, he asked, ‘Is there any means by which I may avoid going
to hell?’ The Blessed One said, ‘If you make the chief cook, the Brahmin woman
Kapilā, give Jaina monks food and drink with devotion, [and] make her worship
them in thought, or if you prevent that butcher Kāla from killing buffaloes even
for one day, then you will not go to the infernal world.’60
Haribhadra’. According to the ĀvN cited in Haribhadra’s ĀvṬ (531b12-13), the verse
(§1158) reads: ṇa seṇio āsi tayā bahussuo, na yāvi pannattidharo na vāyago | so āgamissāi jiṇo
bhavissai, samikkha pannāi varaṃ khu daṃsaṇaṃ || According to Haribhadra’s explanation,
pannatti (< prajñāpti) refers to the Bhagavatī (‘Holy One’), i.e., the Vyākhyā-prajñapti, and
vāyaga (< vācaka) refers to one versed in the Pūrvas (‘Ancient Texts’).
58. The text has āṇāhi, imp. 2nd. sg. of ā-√ṇā which could have been derived from Skt. ā-√jñā
(‘to know’) or from ā-√nī (‘to bring’), but in either case, the meaning does not fit the pres-
ent context. Here I adopt the reading tubbhehiṃ nāhehiṃ (instr. pl., literally ‘with you as my
protectors’) given in Haribhadra’s ĀvṬ (681a4).
59. ĀvC ii. 169.4-5, 7-9: bhagavaṃ āha:…tumaṃ jāva jīvasi tāva suhaṃ. mato naragaṃ jāhisi…seṇio
sāmiṃ bhaṇati: bhagavaṃ āṇāhi ahaṃ kīsa narakaṃ jāmi? keṇa vā uvāeṇaṃ narakaṃ na gacchejjā?
sāmī bhaṇati: jadi kālasoyariyaṃ sūṇaṃ moehi jadi ya kavilaṃ māhaṇiṃ bhikkhaṃ davāvehi to
tumaṃ pi na gacchejjāsi narakaṃ. See also the corresponding passage in Haribhadra’s ĀvṬ
(681a1-5).
60. Williams (1959: 73–74, verses 408–14): evaṃ soūṇa nivo dukkhā-pūriya-maṇo payam-
pei | tubbhehiṃ nāhehiṃ kim ahaṃ narayaṃ gamissāmi || bhaṇiyo ya bhagavayā nivo narae
baddh’-āuo tumaṃ puvviṃ | na ya nāho ’mhi ahaṃ te tao ya adhiiṃ pariharesu || aṃsūṇi phusasu

As in the ĀvC version of the story, Śreṇika fails to persuade Kapilā and Kāla, and
his failure suggests the inevitability of the karmic law. According to the pas-
sage above, the reason why Śreṇika will be reborn in hell is that he has previ-
ously been bound with certain bad karma leading to a lifespan in hell, though
the text does not specify what his bad karma was. Like the aforementioned
Āvaśyaka-niryukti, this text also speaks of Śreṇika’s adoption of the ‘pure right
view [of reality]’ (Pkt. visuddha-sammatta < Skt. viśuddha-samyaktva) in his
present life. The acquisition of the right view (Skt. samyag-darśana or samyak-
tva) is of great significance in Jaina soteriology, for it is believed that any soul
that has acquired samyag-darśana will attain liberation (either as an arhat or
as a tīrthaṅkara) at some future time. The first experience of samyag-darśana
brings the soul into a stage called samyag-dṛṣṭi (‘right sight’) that ‘functionally
correspond[s] to the darśana-mārga or the sotāpatti-magga of the Buddhists’
(Jaini 2000: 118 n. 19).61 Thus, Śreṇika’s acquisition of samyag-darśana in Jaina
literature bears a striking resemblance to Bimbisāra’s attainment of srotāpatti
(‘stream-winning’) in Buddhist literature. However, while the Buddhists said
little about Bimbisāra’s future spiritual status, the Jainas provided definitive
prophecies of Śreṇika’s eventual tīrthaṅkarahood, and thereby demonstrated
a complete process from his entry into the path to his realization of liberation.
In another version of this story found in the Cauppaṇṇamahāpurisacariya
(‘Deeds of Fifty-four Great Persons’; CMPC) written by the Śvetāmbara monk
Śīlāṅka in the ninth century ce, Mahāvīra explains to Śreṇika the reason for his
rebirth in hell, saying: ‘O King, being engaged in excessive control [derived]
from kingship, one acquires the karma leading to the destiny of hell’.62 Śreṇika
is surprised to know that such a fate can be his. Mahāvīra then consoles him
as follows:
O Beloved of the Gods! Do not get agitated. You have been bound with a lifespan [in
hell], and there is no other remedy here [than to accept the law of karma?]. Even
so, do not speak of despair. The karmic result is hard to avoid. [Eventually,] in the
coming ascending age you will become a tīrthaṅkara.63
Seṇiya visuddha-sammatta-dhārao | tammi narayāo uvvaṭṭiya Bharahe Ussappiṇī-samae || hosi

Siripauma-nāho āima-titthayaro tti vayaṇeṇaṃ | uddhusio so jalahara-jaleṇa dhārā-kayambo vva ||
punar avi vandiya pucchai bhayavaṃ kiṃ atthi ko vi uvāo | jeṇāhaṃ na ya narae vayāmi bhayavaṃ tao
bhaṇai || Kavilaṃ mahāṇasiṇiṃ vippiṃ sāhūṇa jai davāvesi | bhattīe bhatta-pāṇaṃ vandāvesi bhāvao
ya muṇī || mahise ya haṇantaṃ vā jai vārasi eya-Kālasoyariyaṃ | ega-divasaṃ pi ya tahā na ya
gacchasi naraya-puḍhavīe || My translation is indebted to that of Williams (1959: 167–68), but
differs in places.
61. The original paper (Jaini 1981: 103 n. 19) gives bhāvanā-mārga, emended to darśana-mārga in
the reprinted edition (Jaini 2000).
62. CMPC 320.3: tumaṃ rāyā, rajjaṃ ca bahuyāhigaraṇattaṇao ṇarayagatijoggaṃ kammam āvahai
(bahuyāhigaraṇattaṇao < bahuka-adhikaraṇa-ātmanaka [‘engaging oneself in excessive con-
trol’]; rajjaṃ < rajjā < rājyāt [‘from kingship’]).
63. CMPC 320.18-20: bho devāṇuppiyā mā addhiiṃ karesu. baddhāuo tumaṃ ṇa ya ettha aṇṇo patīyāro.
tahā vi mā visāyaṃ vacca. dullaṃghā kammapariṇatī. āgamissāe ussappiṇīe tumae titthayareṇa
hoyavvaṃ ti.

Largely the same story also appears in the Triṣaṣṭiśalākāpuruṣacarita of Hema-

candra.64
Besides the Śvetāmbaras, the Digambaras have also provided information
on Śreṇika’s future destiny. For instance, the Harivaṃśapurāṇa (‘Purāṇa of the
Lineage of Hari’; HP) written by Jinasena in 783 ce contains two verses speaking
of a reduction of the duration (sthiti) of Śreṇika’s lifespan in hell (nārakāyus),
due to his acquisition of the ‘destructive right view’ (kṣāyika-samyaktva) in
this life:
Because of excessive killing and possessiveness, Śreṇika had in the past acquired
an infernal lifespan with the maximum duration in the seventh hell. However,
because of his destructive right view, he acquired the duration [of an infernal lifes-
pan] of eighty-four thousand years in the first hell.65
The change of Śreṇika’s destiny from the seventh hell to the first hell, i.e.,
from the lowest to the highest hell, is crucial for his eventual liberation, since
according to the HP, it is impossible for those living in the last four hells to
attain tīrthaṅkarahood, whereas ‘an embodied soul, purified by the [right]
view, having come out from the first, the second, or the third [hell], may
attain tīrthaṅkarahood’.66
In the Bṛhatkathākośa (‘Great Treasury of Stories’; BKK) composed by the
Digambara monk Hariṣeṇa in the tenth century ce, we find a more detailed
account of Śreṇika’s acquisition of the right view in this life and his future
jinahood:
The Dharma was taught by the Muni [Mahāvīra], expounded by the Jina, to
[Śreṇika], inasmuch as the pure right view arose to him instantly. The lifespan of
thirty-three oceans [of years, i.e., thirty-three sāgaropamas] there [i.e., in the sev-
enth hell] which had been acquired [by Śreṇika] was entirely destroyed thereby
[i.e., by the right view he attained], because of his meeting with the great Muni.67
[As a result,] the king [Śreṇika] was bound with a lifespan of eighty-four thousand
years in the enclosed hell, in the state of existence in the first hell… After various
painful experiences,68 when the right time comes, the duration of [Śreṇika’s infer-
nal] lifespan [will] have expired, and King Śreṇika will escape from the enclosed
[hell]. He will become the excellent son of a wealthy patriarch who is the fore-
64. Śāha (1977: 272.11–74.10, verses 139–65); trans. Johnson (1931–1962: vi. 238–39).
65. HP II, verses 136–37 (Jain 1962: 22.8-9): śreṇikena tu yat pūrvaṃ bahvārambhaparigrahāt | para-
sthitikam ārabdhaṃ narakāyus tamastame || tat tu kṣāyikasamyaktvāt svasthitiṃ prathamakṣitāu |
prāpad varṣasahasrāṇām aśītiṃ caturuttarām || See also a trans. and discussion in Wiley (2003:
351).
66. HP IV, verse 381 (Jain 1962: 69.1): tṛtīyāyāḥ dvitīyāyā prathamāyāś ca niḥsṛtaḥ | tīrthakṛttvaṃ
labhetāpi dehī darśanaśuddhitaḥ. See also a comment on this verse in Balbir (1991: 46).
67. This sentence seems to mean that Śreṇika has attained kṣāyika-samyaktva which has the
power of destroying all darśana-mohanīya (‘insight-deluding’) karma (Jaini 1979: 146).
68. The text has duḥkham āsukham. The accusative duḥkham seems to be used here as an adverb
in the sense of ‘through suffering’; āsukham (ā + sukham (acc.)) is also an adverb meaning
‘until happiness’. Thus the whole phrase literally means ‘through suffering, until happi-
ness’.

most hero [named] Padma connected with the fourteen [patriarchs of this age].
[That son will become] the glorious first tīrthaṅkara, a great teacher of the whole
world, with a lifespan of seventy-two years, and a body [of the height of] seven
cubits. Right here, in the land of Bharata, in a region which consists of the mid-
land and its surrounding areas,69 at the time of the third stage of the ascending
age which will bring happiness to humans, this one, Mahāpadma by name, [will
become] a spiritual teacher abiding in this world, [being] a great ocean of good
qualities and moral conducts, joined by a group of disciples [holding a collection
of] twelve Aṅgas [?].70 Endowed with thirty-four good qualities, attended by [eight]
miraculous phenomena, this Svāmin will dwell on the surface of the earth, teach-
ing the Dharma.71
According to this account, it is through meeting Mahāvīra and hearing

his exposition of the Dharma that Śreṇika acquires the ‘pure right view’
(śuddha-samyaktva) which, in turn, leads to the reduction of his lifespan in
hell. According to Jaina philosophy, in order to acquire the right view, a soul
must have an innate quality called bhavyatva, ‘capability for liberation’ (Jaini
1977). Not all souls have such a quality, and not all the souls who have such
a quality will realize their potential. ‘The bhavyatva can be aroused, thus
initiating an irreversible turning of the soul towards mokṣa, only when the
soul encounters a particular set of outside conditions while being itself suffi-
ciently “ready” to respond to them’ (Jaini 1979: 140). Śreṇika’s acquisition of
the right view in this life may be seen as resulting from the confluent work-
ings of at least three factors, including his innate bhavyatva, his meeting with
Mahāvīra, and his receiving teachings from Mahāvīra.
Furthermore, although the attainment of the right view initiates the pro-
cess that leads to mokṣa, the right view alone is far from sufficient to make one
a tīrthaṅkara. In fact, many people with the right view have not yet attained
omniscience (kevala-jñāna), and most of those who have attained omniscience
are ordinary arhats who are unable to teach.72 Tīrthaṅkarahood is reserved for
69. This is a tentative translation of madhyamādikamaṇḍale (‘in a region consisting of the mid-
dle and so on’).
70. The text has dvādaśāṅkagaṇāyukto, of which the former part dvādaśāṅka (‘twelve marks’)
may be emended to dvādaśāṅga (‘twelve limbs’) referring to the twelve Aṅgas of the Jainas.
71. BKK LV, verses 303–305, 310–15 (Upādhye 1943: 87.17–19, 24–29): muninā ’sya tathā dharmaḥ
kathito jinadeśitaḥ | yathā ’yaṃ śuddhasamyaktvo babhūva kṣaṇamātrataḥ || āyur yad arjitaṃ ta-
tra trayastriṃśatsamudrajam | tad anena hataṃ sarvaṃ mahāmunisamāgamāt || sīmantanarake
rājā prathamaśvabhrasaṃbhave | sahasrāṇāṃ babandha āyur aśītiś caturuttarā ||…|| duḥkham
āsukham ākāle praviṣṭe śreṇiko nṛpaḥ | bhuktas tv āyuḥpramāṇaḥ san sīmantān nirgamiṣyati
|| aṣṭāviṃśārdhayuktasya bhoginaḥ kulakāriṇaḥ | padmādipuṅgavasyāyaṃ bhaviṣyati sutaḥ
paraḥ || dvisaptatyabdasaṃkhyāyuḥ saptahastaśarīrakaḥ | sarvalokaguruḥ śrīmān āditīrthakaro
mahān || ihaiva bharatakṣetre madhyamādikamaṇḍale | utsarpiṇītṛtīyākhye kāle janasukhāvahe
|| nāmato ’yaṃ mahāpadmo lokāvasthitideśikaḥ | dvādaśāṅkagaṇāyukto guṇaśīlamahodadhiḥ ||
catustriṃśadguṇopetaḥ prātihāryasamanvitaḥ | dharmaṃ diśann asau svāmī vihariṣyati mahītale ||
72. The Jainas hold that an arhat and a tīrthaṅkara are both omniscient. They are distinguished
by ‘the presence or absence of certain miraculous powers, notably the divya-dhvani (“divine
sound”) which enables certain omniscient beings to be Teachers’ (Jaini 1981: 97).

a chosen few. Only those who have acquired a special type of karmic matter
known as tīrthaṅkara-nāma-karma, i.e., the nāma-karma which confers the
‘nature of a ford-maker’ (tīrthaṅkara-prakṛti), can be reborn as tīrthaṅkaras.73 The
Jainas hold that one gains tīrthaṅkara-nāma-karma through practising some or
all of a series of meritorious activities which are recorded as twenty sthānakas
(‘components’) in Śvetāmbara texts and as sixteen bhāvanās (‘cultivations’)
in Digambara texts.74 They also believe that these activities would become
futile if one practises them with the aim of attaining tīrthaṅkarahood.75 The
enumeration of twenty sthānakas or sixteen bhāvanās ‘appears to be closely
related to the avasarpiṇī-mythology [cf. above, note 54] and they represent,
as it were, an attempt to give a rational account of the T[īrthaṅkara]s’ exis-
tence on earth, in accordance with the law of karman and rebirth’ (Balbir
1991: 47). Further, ‘[t]hough the Tnk-causes [= tīrthaṅkara-nāma-karma causes,
namely twenty sthānakas or sixteen bhāvanās] do not occur explicitly in the
context of utsarpiṇī, they probably have to be applied there also’ (p. 47). In
the case of Śreṇika who is said to become the first tīrthaṅkara of the next
utsarpiṇī, although the extant Jaina literature makes no mention of the reason
for his tīrthaṅkarahood, we may assume that his eventual tīrthaṅkarahood
represents the fruition of his tīrthaṅkara-nāma-karma acquired in the present
life (or in a past life) through practising some or all of the twenty sthānakas or
sixteen bhāvanās.
In sum, a number of Jaina sources from both the Śvetāmbara and Digam-
bara traditions tell us that Śreṇika will go to hell in his next birth due to his bad
karma, and that after rising from hell, in his following birth, he will become the
first tīrthaṅkara of the coming age. According to Jaina philosophy, a soul who
retains the right view at the time of death is normally not reborn as a hell-
being (nāraki) or as an animal (tiryañca).76 However, since Śreṇika had already
incurred the karma leading to a lifespan in hell even before his acquisition
of the right view, it is impossible for him to avoid the fate of hell, although,
according to the Digambara texts such as Jinasena’s Harivaṃśapurāṇa and
Hariṣeṇa’s Bṛhatkathākośa, it is possible for him to reduce his lifespan in hell
through the power of his right view. Thus the Jaina prophecies of Śreṇika’s
73. The nāma-karma refers to one category of karmic matter ‘by which a soul is identified as
being a man, animal, heavenly being, or hell being; this karma determines these births and
provides the appropriate body, sense, mind, sex, and color’ (Jaini 1979: 132). For a specific
study of the concept of tīrthaṅkara-prakṛti, see Jaini (1981).
74. See a list of the twenty sthānakas in Hemacandra’s Triṣaṣṭiśalākāpuruṣacarita (Caraṇavijaya
1990: 27.35–28.21, verses 882–903 (text); Johnson 1931–1962: i. 80–84 (trans.)). For other re-
lated sources, see Balbir (1991: 66 n. 78). For a list of the sixteen bhāvanās, see Jaini (1979:
260; 1981: 98).
75. The Jainas maintain that any such intention ‘would itself constitute an unwholesome act’
and would render one’s virtues impure (see Jaini 1981: 99).
76. This is because such a soul does not bind the sub-variety (uttara-prakṛti) of āyu-karma (i.e.,
karma determining the span of a given lifetime) that causes such an undesirable rebirth
(Wiley 2006: 452 n. 31; Jaini 1979: 144).

future rebirths illustrate both the ineluctability of the karmic law and a soul’s
ability to attain ultimate freedom from karmic bondages.77
Comparative Remarks
I now return to the two questions raised at the beginning of this article: How
differently did the Buddhists and Jainas in ancient India portray the future
rebirths of Bimbisāra/Śreṇika and Ajātasatru/Kūṇika? What can we learn
from such differences about the Buddhist and Jaina authors themselves, par-
ticularly regarding their karmic views and soteriological approaches? Based
on the textual evidence presented above, we may answer the first question
as follows.
With regard to Bimbisāra/Śreṇika, there are two basic differences between
the Buddhist and Jaina accounts. First, while the Buddhists claimed that after
his death Bimbisāra was reborn in the heaven of Vaiśravaṇa, the Jainas gen-
erally agreed that Śreṇika was reborn in hell due to certain bad karma he had
bound, though there were various opinions among the Jainas themselves as
to what his bad karma exactly was.78 Second, while both the Buddhists and
Jainas spoke of Bimbisāra’s/Śreṇika’s entry into the path to liberation in this
life, only the Jainas provided us with prophecies of his realization of liber-
ation. There seems to be no definitive prediction of Bimbisāra’s liberation
in extant Buddhist literature. The only Buddhist sources that give us some
clue about his future spiritual status are the Pāli Janavasabhasutta and its two
Chinese parallels (T. 1[4] and T. 9), which all tell us that after becoming a
stream-winner Bimbisāra is reborn seven times in the heaven of Vaiśravaṇa,
implying that he will attain arhatship and nirvāṇa there. Among the three
sources, only the *Janeṣaha-sūtra of the Chinese Dīrghāgama (T. 1[4]) actually
mentions Bimbisāra’s ultimate liberation, and only in a brief and formulaic
manner. The scarcity of information on Bimbisāra’s future destiny in Bud-
dhist literature suggests that the Buddhists were not much concerned with
the salvation of this personage who has already embarked on the path to lib-
eration. In contrast, the abundance of information on Śreṇika’s rise from hell
and eventual tīrthaṅkarahood in Jaina literature suggests that the Jainas were
much concerned with his salvation, and moreover used him as an example to
illustrate both the workings of karma and a soul’s capability of overcoming
karmic bondages.
77. Like Śreṇika, Vāsudeva-Kṛṣṇa is also said to be reborn as a hell-being in his next life and
then as a future tīrthaṅkara in his following life (Balbir 1991: 42–43).
78. Śreṇika’s suicide in prison is often said to be the cause of his rebirth in hell (Jaini 1979:
228; Dundas 2002: 41). However, as shown above, in his CMPC Śīlāṅka explains Śreṇika’s
fate of hell as resulting from his ‘excessive control [derived] from kingship’ (rajjaṃ ca
bahuyāhigaraṇattaṇao), and in his HP Jinasena considers the cause to be Śreṇika’s ‘excessive
killing and possessiveness’ (bahvārambha-parigrahāt).

With regard to Ajātaśatru/Kūṇika, there are also two basic differences

between the Buddhist and Jaina accounts. First, while both Buddhists and
Jainas agreed on Ajātaśatru’s/Kūṇika’s next birth in hell, their understandings
of its cause were different. In Buddhist traditions, Ajātaśatru is regarded as a
patricide, an ānantarya criminal, and his next birth in hell is the karmic result
of his patricide. In the Jaina sources, which speak of Śreṇika’s suicide instead
of Kūṇika’s patricide, Kūṇika’s death and rebirth in hell are told after his war
against Ceṭaka, which suggests that his fate of hell is the karmic result of his
military violence. Second, while the Jainas kept silent on Kūṇika’s destiny
after his life in hell, the Buddhists provided various prophecies of Ajātaśatru’s
future rebirths and his ultimate liberation. We have seen three examples: (1)
According to Buddhaghosa, Ajātasattu will be reborn in a copper-pot hell, but
after going downwards and upwards only once in that hell, he will be released
and finally become a paccekabuddha. Both the mitigation of Ajātasattu’s pun-
ishment in hell and his paccekabuddhahood are the karmic rewards for his
visit to the Buddha and hearing the Buddha’s sermon in this life, demonstrat-
ing the salvific power of the Buddha and of his teachings. (2) According to a
sūtra in the Chinese Ekottarikāgama (T. 125 [38.11]), Ajātaśatru will fall into a
bouncing-ball hell (rather than going to the Avīci hell as he is supposed to),
after which he will be continuously reborn in heaven and then attain praty
ekabuddhahood as a human. The mitigation of Ajātaśatru’s suffering in hell,
his continuous divine rebirths and his final awakening are all said to be the
karmic fruits of his faith in the Buddhist Dharma in this life, and therefore all
demonstrate the salvific power of what the Buddha taught. (3) According to
the AjKV, although Ajātaśatru will fall into hell, he will quickly get out with-
out suffering any pain, and will finally becoming a buddha. Ajātaśatru’s crime
is purged away due to his realization of the doctrine of emptiness preached by
the Bodhisattva Mañjuśrī. His final buddhahood represents the culmination
of his multi-life spiritual cultivation under the guidance of Mañjuśrī. Thus, in
the AjKV Ajātaśatru’s future rebirths and his liberation demonstrate both the
purifying efficacy of the doctrine of emptiness and the salvific capability of
Mañjuśrī.
Let us now consider the second question: What can we learn from the
accounts of future rebirths of Bimbisāra/Śreṇika and Ajātaśatru/Kūṇika about
the karmic views and soteriological approaches of their Buddhist and Jaina
authors? On the Buddhist side, the authors who told (or retold) the prophe-
cies of Ajātaśatru’s future rebirths and his liberation showed clear attempts
to reconcile the karmic law with other religious factors including the power
of the Buddha, the salvific capability of the Bodhisattva Mañjuśrī, and the
efficacy of the Buddhist Dharma. The reconciliation goes to the extreme in
the AjKV, where the karmic law is almost entirely annihilated, insofar as
although Ajātaśatru will go to hell, he will feel no pain. From the point of view
of those Buddhist authors, even the worst karma such as Ajātaśatru’s patricide
can be mitigated through an encounter with the Buddha (or with an arche-

typal bodhisattva such as Mañjuśrī), or through hearing Buddhist teachings.

To be sure, not all Indian Buddhists endorsed such a view. For instance, the
Pāli Sāmaññaphala-sutta stresses that despite hearing the Buddha’s sermon,
Ajātasattu is still hindered by his patricide from making spiritual progress.
Nevertheless, the above prophecies of Ajātaśatru’s ultimate liberation suggest
that some Buddhists in ancient India were particularly concerned with the
salvation of morally corrupt or karmically trapped ones such as Ajātaśatru,
and contended that their salvation relies predominantly on the divine inter-
vention of the Buddha (or a bodhisattva such as Mañjuśrī) and on the efficacy
of the Buddhist Dharma.
On the Jaina side, the Śvetāmbara authors of the prophecies of Śreṇika’s
future rebirths took an uncompromising stance on the karmic law, empha-
sizing that Śreṇika’s next birth in hell cannot be changed in any way. Two
Digambara authors (Jinasena and Hariṣeṇa) suggested that although Śreṇika
has to go to hell due to his bad karma, his lifespan in hell is reduced due to
his acquisition of the right view later in this life. By suggesting this point,
Jinasena and Hariṣeṇa affirmed a soul’s ability to modify the effects of the
karma already incurred. Both the Śvetāmbaras and Digambaras agreed on
Śreṇika’s acquisition of the right view. According to Jaina philosophy, not
all souls are able to attain the right view. If a soul has the quality of bhavyatva,
and if its bhavyatva is activated under certain favourable conditions (includ-
ing, for instance, meeting a tīrthaṅkara, and hearing Jaina teachings), such a
soul can attain the right view. If a soul does not have the quality of bhavyatva,
it always remains in the state of false view (mithyātva) and will never attain
the right view. The Jaina sources presented above show that both Śreṇika
and Kūṇika meet Mahāvīra. While Śreṇika attains the right view, Kūṇika
is still deluded by egoism. Clearly, Śreṇika’s attainment of the right view is
not totally at the mercy of Mahāvīra, but results from the confluent work-
ings of his innate bhavyatva, his encounter with Mahāvīra, and his receiv-
ing teachings from Mahāvīra. Further, while the attainment of the right
view guarantees one’s ultimate liberation, it does not suffice to make one
a tīrthaṅkara. The Jainas believe that one attains tīrthaṅkarahood through
practising a series of meritorious activities—twenty sthānakas according to
the Śvetāmbaras, or sixteen bhāvanās according to the Digambaras—that
lead to the binding of tīrthaṅkara-nāma-karma. Despite the lack of informa-
tion on the reason for Śreṇika’s tīrthaṅkarahood in extant Jaina literature,
it can be assumed that his attainment of tīrthaṅkarahood is due to his bind-
ing of tīrthaṅkara-nāma-karma in this life (or in a past life), through practising
some or all of the twenty sthānakas or sixteen bhāvanās. Thus, Śreṇika’s even-
tual tīrthaṅkarahood comes as a result of a confluence of at least four factors,
namely, his innate bhavyatva, his encounter with Mahāvīra in this life, his
hearing teachings from Mahāvīra, and his practice of the meritorious activi-
ties leading to the acquisition of tīrthaṅkara-nāma-karma. This soteriological
mechanism differs considerably from that shown in the Buddhist prophecies

of Ajātaśatru, whose liberation relies almost entirely on the intervention of

the Buddha (or Mañjuśrī) and of the Buddhist Dharma.
To conclude, a comparative survey of Buddhist and Jaina accounts of the
future rebirths of Bimbisāra/Śreṇika and Ajātaśatru/Kūṇika suggests that the
Buddhists and Jainas who composed those accounts held significantly differ-
ent understandings of how key religious factors—such as karma, the Dharma,
the power of the Buddha or Mahāvīra, and an individual’s innate spiritual
potential—play out in soteriological discourse. The survey also shows that
both the Buddhist prophecies of Ajātaśatru’s descent into hell and his even-
tual awakening, and the Jaina prophecies of Śreṇika’s descent into hell and his
eventual tīrthaṅkarahood, share a common idea that moral culpability has no
permanent karmic effects and thus constitutes no real obstacle to spiritual
growth in the long run. Further work needs to be done in order to understand
why each tradition chose to focus on one character rather than the other.
While it is clear that the Buddhist attempts to save Ajātaśatru were essen-
tially related to his identity as an ānantarya criminal and ultimately devoted
to demonstrating the salvific power of the Buddha (or Mañjuśrī) and the effi-
cacy of the Buddhist Dharma, it is still unclear why the Jainas said little about
Kūṇika’s future destiny, and what drove them to grant tīrthaṅkarahood to
Śreṇika whose future spiritual status does not seem to have been definitively
prophesied by the Buddhists. Given that the Buddhists and Jainas in ancient
India did not live in isolation from one another, it is likely that they were
aware of stories about these two characters in each other’s tradition. We may
speculate whether there was any underlying connection between the Bud-
dhist and Jaina choices to focus on the salvation of one character rather than
that of the other. Though no conclusive answer can be given for the moment,
this question is certainly worth pursuing in the future.
Acknowledgement
The research for this article was supported by a Grant-in-Aid (Number 24

• 02303) for Scientific Research from the Japan Society for the Promotion of
Science.
A Note on Citation and Technical Details
Unless otherwise indicated, all Pāli, Sanskrit and Prākrit texts are cited by
volume (if applicable), page and line numbers of the editions used. In citing
Pāli texts, volume and page references are to the Pāli Text Society edition;
references to line numbers follow the system commonly used for Buddhist
Sanskrit texts. For instance, AN I 233.12-15 refers to Aṅguttara-nikāya, volume
I, page 233, from line 12 to line 15. In citing Chinese texts, I have adopted

the conventional format: T. 1234. 123a12-34. This means that the text is num-
bered 1234 in the Taishō canon, found on page 123, register a, from line 12 to
line 34. All punctuations of Chinese texts are my own. An asterisk (*) before
a Sanskrit term or title denotes that this term or title is reconstructed from a
Chinese or Tibetan transliteration or translation.
Abbreviations
AjKV *Ajātaśatrukaukṛtyavinodana
AN Aṅguttara-nikāya (Morris and Hardy 1885–1900)
ĀvC Āvaśyaka-cūrṇi attributed to Jinadāsa. Śrīmaj-Jinadāsagaṇi-
mahattara-kṛtayā sūtra-cūrṇyā sametaṃ śrīmad-Āvaśyakasūtram. 2
vols. Ratlam: Śrīṛṣabhadevajī Keśarīmalajī Śvetāṃbara saṃsthā,
1928–29
ĀvN Āvaśyaka-niryukti (cited in Haribhadra’s ĀvṬ)
ĀvṬ Haribhadra’s Āvaśyaka-ṭīkā. Śrīmad-bhavaviraha-Haribhadrasūri-
sūtrita-vṛtty-alaṃkṛtaṃ Śrīmad-Āvaśyakasūtram. Bombay:
Agamodaya Samiti, 1916–17
BKK Hariṣeṇa’s Bṛhatkathākośa (Upādhye 1943)
CMPC Śīlāṅka’s Cauppaṇṇamahāpurisacariya (Bhojak 1961)
DasCA Dasaveyāliyacuṇṇi attributed to Agastyasiṃha (Punyavijaya 1973)
DasCJ Dasaveyāliyacuṇṇi attributed to Jinadāsa. Prasiddhyā Śrī-
Jinadāsagaṇi-mahattara-racitā Śrī-Daśavaikālika-cūrṇiḥ. Ratlam:
Ṛṣabhadevajī Keśarīmalajī Śvetāmbara saṃsthā, 1933.
Dhp-a Dhammapadaṭṭhakathā (H. C. Norman 1906–1914)
DN Dīgha-nikāya (Rhys Davids and Carpenter 1890–1911)
DPG Dhammagiri-Pāli-Ganthamālā. Publication of the Burmese Sixth
Council edition of the Pāli canon in Devanāgarī script. Igatpuri:
Vipassana Research Institute, 1993–1998
HP Jinasena’s Harivaṃśapurāṇa (Jain 1962)
Ja Jātakatthavaṇṇanā (Fausbøll 1877–1896)
Pkt. Prākrit
SHT Sanskrithandschriften aus den Turfanfunden, Teil 1-11. Edited
by Ernst Waldschmidt et al. Verzeichnis der orientalischen
Handschriften in Deutschland, Band X, 1-11. Wiesbaden: Franz
Steiner, 1965-2012.
Skt. Sanskrit
Sn Sutta-nipāta (Andersen and Smith 1913)
Spk Sāratthappakāsinī (Woodward 1929–1937)

Sv Sumaṅgalavilāsinī (Rhys Davids and Carpenter 1886)

T. Taishō Shinshū Daizōkyō 大正新脩大藏經. Edited by Takakusu
Junjirō 高楠順次郎 and Watanabe Kaikyoku 渡邊海旭. 100 vols.
Tokyo: Taishō Issaikyō Kankōkai 大正一切經刊行會, 1924–1935.
Ṭhāṇ Ṭhāṇaṅga (Jambūvijaya 2002–2003)
trans. translated; translation
References
Akanuma, Chizen 赤沼智善. 1931. Indo bukkyō koyū meishi jiten 印度佛教固有名詞辞典 [Diction-
ary of Proper Names in Indian Buddhism]. Reprint: Kyoto: Hōzōkan 法蔵館, 1967.
Andersen, Dines, and Helmer Smith (eds.). 1913. Sutta-Nipāta. Reprint: London: The Pali Text Soci-
ety, 1984.
Balbir, Nalini. 1991. ‘Tīrthaṃkaras of the Future.’ In M. A. Dhaky and Sagarmal Jain (eds.), Aspects
of Jainology Vol. 3: Pt. Dalsukhbhai Malvania Felicitation Volume I: 34–68. Varanasi: P. V. Research
Institute.
— 1993. Āvaśyaka-Studien. Introduction générale et Traductions. Alt- und Neu-Indische Studien 45.1.
Stuttgart: Franz Steiner Verlag.
Bhojak, Amritlāl Mohanlāl (ed.). 1961. Siri-Sīlaṅkāyariya-viraiyaṃ Cauppannamahāpurisacariyaṃ.
Prakrit Text Series Vol. 3. Vārāṇasī: Prākṛta Grantha Pariṣad.
Bühler, Johann Georg. 1887. Über die indische Secte der Jaina. Vortrag gehalten in der feierlichen
Sitzung der Kaiserlichen Akademie der Wissenschaften am xxvi. Mai MDCCCLXXXVII. Wien:
K. K. Hof- und Staatsdruckerei.
— 1903. On the Indian Sect of the Jainas. Translated from the German, edited with an Outline of Jaina
Mythology by James Burgess. London: Luzac & Co.
Burlingame, Eugene Watson (trans.). 1921. Buddhist Legends: Translated from the Original Pali Text of
the Dhammapada Commentary. 3 vols. Harvard Oriental Series 28, 29, 30. Cambridge, MA: Har-
vard University Press.
Caraṇavijaya, Muni (ed.). 1990. Kalikālasarvajña Śrī-Hemacandrācārya-viracitaṃ Triṣaṣṭiśalākāpuruṣa-
caritamahākāvyam. Prathamaṃ Parva. Ahmadābād: Kalikāla-sarvajña Śrī-Hemacandrācārya
Navama Janmaśatābdī Smṛti.
Cowell, Edward Byles, and Robert Alexander Neil (eds.). 1886. The Divyāvadāna: A Collection of Early
Buddhist Legends. First published in Cambridge. Reprint: Amsterdam: Oriental Press NV/Philo
Press, 1970.
Cowell, Edward Byles, et al. (trans.). 1895–1907. The Jātaka, or Stories of the Buddha’s Former Births. 6
vols. Reprint: London: The Pali Text Society, 1981.
Das, Sarat Chandra, and Hari Mohan Vidyābhūṣaṇa (and Satis Chandra Vidyābhūṣaṇa) (eds.). 1888–
1918. Bodhisattvāvadānakalpalatā. Bibliotheca Indica 124. 2 vols. Calcutta: Baptist Mission Press.
Deleu, Jozef. 1969. ‘Nirayāvaliyāsuyakkhandha: Uvanga’s 8-12 van de jaina Canon.’ Orientalia Gan-
densia 4: 77–150.
— 1970. Viyāhapannatti (Bhagavaī): The Fifth Anga of the Jaina Canon: Introduction, Critical Analysis,
Commentary & Indexes. First published in Brugge (Belgium). Reprint: Delhi: Motilal Banarsi-
dass, 1996.
Dundas, Paul. 2002. The Jains. 2nd edn. London and New York: Routledge.
Fausbøll, Michel Viggo (ed.). 1877–1896. The Jātaka, Together with its Commentary. 6 vols. London:
Trübner & Co.
Gnoli, Raniero (ed.). 1977–1978. The Gilgit Manuscript of the Saṅghabhedavastu: Being the 17th and Last
Section of the Vinaya of the Mūlasarvāstivādin. Serie Orientale Roma 49, 1–2. Roma: Is. M. E. O.

Granoff, Phyllis. 2012. ‘After Sinning: Some Thoughts on Remorse, Responsibility, and the Reme-
dies for Sin in Indian Religious Traditions.’ In Phyllis Granoff and Koichi Shinohara (eds.), Sins
and Sinners: Perspectives from Asian Religions: 175–215. Leiden: Brill.
Hare, Edward Miles (trans.). 1934. The Book of the Gradual Sayings (Anguttara-Nikāya) or More-
Numbered Suttas. Vol. III (The Books of the Fives and Sixes). Reprint: London: The Pali Text
Society, 1973.
Harrison, Paul, and Jens-Uwe Hartmann. 2000. ‘Ajātaśatrukaukṛtyavinodanāsūtra.’ In Jens Braar-
vig et al. (eds.), Manuscripts in the Schøyen Collection: Buddhist Manuscripts: Vol. I, 167–216. Oslo:
Hermes Publishing.
Hartmann, Jens-Uwe. 2004. ‘Contents and Structure of the Dīrghāgama of the (Mūla-) Sarvāsti
vādins.’ Annual Report of the International Research Institute for Advanced Buddhology at Soka Uni-
versity 7: 119-137.
von Hinüber, Oskar. 1998. Entstehung und Aufbau der Jātaka-Sammlung. Studien zur Literatur des
Theravāda-Buddhismus I. Stuttgart: Franz Steiner Verlag.
Hiraoka, Satoshi 平岡聡 (trans.). 2010. Budda no ōinaru monogatari: Bonbun Mahāvastu Zenyaku ブッ
ダの大いなる物語. 梵文『マハーヴァストゥ』全訳 [A Complete Japanese Translation
of the Sanskrit Mahāvastu]. 2 vols. Tokyo: Daizō Shuppan 大蔵出版.
Jacobi, Hermann. 1879. The Kalpasûtra of Bhadrabâhu, edited with an Introduction, Notes and a Prâkṛit-
Saṃskṛit Glossary. Leipzig: F. A. Brockhaus.
Jain, Panna Lal (ed. and trans.). 1962. Harivaṁśa Purāṇa of Āchārya Jinasena, with Hindi Translation,
Introduction and Appendices. Jñānapīṭha Mūrtidevī Jaina Granthamālā, Sanskrit Grantha 27.
Reprint: New Delhi: Bharatiya Jnanpith, 2003.
Jaini, Padmanabh S. 1977. ‘Bhavyatva and Abhavyatva: A Jaina Doctrine of “Presentation”.’ In
Ādinātha Neminātha Upādhye et al. (eds.), Mahāvīra and his Teachings (2,500 Nirvāṇa Anniversary
Volume): 95–111. Bombay: Bhagavān Mahāvīra 2500th Nirvāṇa Mahotsava Samiti. Reproduced
in Jaini 2000: 95–109.
— 1979. The Jaina Path of Purification. Berkeley: University of California Press. Reprint: Delhi: Moti-
lal Banarsidass, 1990.
— 1981. ‘Tīrthaṅkara-Prakṛti and the Bodhisattva Path.’ Journal of the Pali Text Society 9: 96–104.
Reproduced in Jaini 2000: 111–19.
— 1993. ‘Jaina Purāṇas: A Purāṇic Counter Tradition.’ In Wendy Doniger (ed.), Purāṇa Perennis:
Reciprocity and Transformation in Hindu and Jaina Texts: 207–249. Albany, NY: State University of
New York Press.
Jaini, Padmanabh S. (ed.) 2000. Collected Papers on Jaina Studies. Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass.
Jambūvijaya, Muni (ed.). 2002–2003. Sthānāṅgasūtra with the commentary by Ācārya Śrī Abhayadev-
Sūri Mahārāja. 3 Parts. Jaina-Āgama-Series No. 19. Mumbai: Śrī Mahāvīra Jaina Vidyālaya.
Johnson, Helen M. (trans.) 1931–1962. Triṣaṣṭiśalākāpuruṣacaritra or The Lives of Sixty-Three Illustri-
ous Persons by Ācārya Śrī Hemacandra. 6 vols. Baroda: Oriental Institute.
Jones, John James (trans.). 1949–1956. The Mahāvastu. Reprint: London: The Pali Text Society,
1973–1978.
de Jong, Jan Willem, and Royce Wiles (trans.). 1996. Nirayāvaliyāsuyakkhandha: Uvaṅgas 8-12 of the
Jain Canon: Introduction, Text-edition and Notes by Jozef Deleu. Translated from the Dutch. Tokyo:
The Chūō Academic Research Institute.
Kapadia, Hiralal Rasikdas. 1941. A History of the Canonical Literature of the Jainas. Surat: H. R. Kapa-
dia. Reprint: Fremont, CA: Asian Humanities Press.
Karashima, Seishi 辛嶋静志. 1994. Chōagonkyō no gengo no kenkyū (Onshago bunseki wo chūshin
toshite)『長阿含経』の原語の研究——音写語分析を中心として [A Study of the Underly-
ing Language of the Chinese Dīrghāgama: Focusing on an Analysis of the Transliterations].
Tokyo: Hirakawa Shuppansha 平河出版社.
La Vallée Poussin, Louis de (trans.). 1923–1931. L’Abhidharmakośa de Vasubandhu. 6 vols. Paris: Paul
Geuthner; Louvain: J. B. Istas, Imprimeur.
Lalwani, K. C. (ed. and trans.). 1973–1985. Sudharma Svāmī’s Bhagavatī Sūtra: Prakrit Text with English

Translation and Notes based on the Commentary of Abhayadeva Sūri. 4 vols (Śatakas 1-11). Calcutta:
Jain Bhawan.
Leumann, Ernst. 1934. Übersicht über die Āvaśyaka-Literatur. Alt- und Neu-Indische Studien 4. Ham-
burg: Friederichsen, de Gruyter & Co. M. B. H.
MacQueen, Graeme. 1988. A Study of the Śrāmaṇyaphala-sūtra. Freiburger Beiträge zur Indologie,
Bd. 21. Wiesbaden: Otto Harrassowitz.
Malalasekera, Gunapala Piyasena. 1937–1938. Dictionary of Pāli Proper Names. 2 vols. Reprint: Lon-
don: The Pali Text Society, 1974.
Mehta, Mohanlal, and K. Rishabh Chandra. 1970–1972. Prakrit Proper Names. 2 vols. Ahmedabad:
L. D. Institute of Indology.
Miyazaki, Tenshō 宮崎展昌. 2012. Ajaseōkyō no kenkyū: Sono hensan katei no kaimei wo chūshin toshite
阿闍世王経の研究 — その編纂過程の解明を中心として [A Study of the Ajātaśatrukaukṛtya
vinodana: Focusing on the Compilation Process]. Bibliotheca Indologica et Buddhologica 15.
Tokyo: The Sankibo Press.
— 2013. ‘Future Lives of King Ajātaśatru in Chapter XI of the Ajātaśatrukaukṛtya-vinodana: With
Special Attention to its Similarities with the Account of the Prophecy that King Ajātaśatru
will Become a Pratyekabuddha in Other Buddhist Texts.’ Acta Tibetica et Buddhica 6: 1–19.
Mori, Shōji 森章司, Motozawa Tsunao 本澤綱夫, and Iwai Shōgo 岩井昌悟. 2000. Butsuden
shokyōten oyobi Butsudenkankeishoshiryō no Episōdobetsushuttenyōran. 仏伝諸経典および仏伝
関係諸資料のエピソード別出典要覧 [Sources by Topics of the Buddha’s Biographies and
Related Documents]. Tokyo: The Chūō Academic Research Institute.
Morris, Richard, and Edmund Hardy (eds.). 1885–1900. The Aṅguttara-Nikāya. 5 vols. 2nd edn of
Vol. 1 revised by A. K. Warder and published in 1961. Reprint: London: The Pali Text Society,
1961–1979.
Norman, H. C. (ed.). 1906–1914. The Commentary on the Dhammapada. 4 vols. Reprint: London: The
Pali Text Society, 1970.
Norman, K. R. (trans.). 2001. The Group of Discourses (Sutta-Nipāta). 2nd edn. Translated with Intro-
duction and Notes. Oxford: The Pali Text Society.
Okayama, Hajime 丘山新 et al. (trans.). 1997. Gendaigoyaku Agonkyōten: Jōagonkyō 現代語訳「阿
含経典」長阿含経 [Japanese Translation of the Āgama Texts: Dīrghāgama]. Vol. 2. Tokyo:
Hirakawa Shuppan平河出版.
Panglung, Jampa Losang. 1981. Die Erzählstoffe des Mūlasarvāstivāda-vinaya analysiert auf Grund der
tibetischen Übersetzung. Studia Philologica Buddhica. Monograph Series III. Tokyo: The Reiyu-
kai Library.
Pradhan, Prahlad (ed.). 1967. Abhidharmakośabhāṣya of Vasubandhu. Tibetan Sanskrit Works Series
Vol. VIII. Patna: K. P. Jayaswal Research Institute.
Pulleyblank, Edwin G. 1991. Lexicon of Reconstructed Pronunciation in Early Middle Chinese, Late Middle
Chinese and Early Mandarin. Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press.
Punyavijaya, Muni (ed.). 1973. Sayyaṃbhava’s Dasakāliyasuttaṃ with Bhadrabāhu’s Niryukti and
Agastyasiṃha’s Cūrṇi. Prakrit Text Series Vol. XVII. Reprint: Ahmedabad: Prakrit Text Society,
2003.
Radich, Michael. 2011. How Ajātaśatru Was Reformed: The Domestication of ‘Ajase’ and Stories in Bud-
dhist History. Studia Philologica Buddhica. Monograph Series XXVII. Tokyo: The International
Institute for Buddhist Studies.
Ratnachandraji Maharaj. 1923–1932. An Illustrated Ardha-Māgadhī Dictionary. 4 vols. Vol. 1 pub-
lished by Kesarichand Bhandari (Indore), Vol. 2 by Sardarmal Bhandari (Indore), Vols. 3 and 4
by the Resident General Secretaries (Bombay). Reprint: Tokyo: Meicho-Fukyū-Kai, 1977.
Rhys Davids, Thomas William, and Joseph Estlin Carpenter. 1886. The Sumaṅgala-Vilāsinī: Buddha
ghosa’s Commentary on the Dīgha Nikāya. Part I. Reprint: London: The Pali Text Society, 1968.
— 1890–1911. The Dīgha Nikāya. 3 vols. London: The Pali Text Society.
Sadakata, Akira. 定方晟. 1989. Ajase no Satori 阿闍世のさとり [The Awakening of Ajātaśatru].
Kyoto: Jinbun Shoin 人文書院.

Śāha, Subodhacandra Nānālāla (ed.). 1977. Triṣaṣṭiśalākāpuruṣacaritam Mahākāvyam. Daśamaṃ

Parva. Muṃbaī: Śrīmatī Gaṃgābāī Jaina Ceriṭebala Ṭrasṭa.
Schubring, Walter. 1935. Die Lehre der Jainas nach den alten Quellen dargestellt. Berlin and Leipzig:
W. de Gruyter.
— 1962. The Doctrine of the Jainas: Described after the Old Sources. Trans. from the revised German edi-
tion by Wolfgang Beurlen. Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass.
Senart, Émile Charles Marie. 1882–1897. Le Mahāvastu. Sociéte Asiatique, Collection d’Ouvrages
Orientaux, Seconde Série. Reprint: Tokyo: Meicho Fukyūkai, 1977.
Silk, Jonathan A. 1997. ‘The Composition of the Guan Wuliangshoufo-jing: Some Buddhist and Jaina
Parallels to its Narrative Frame.’ Journal of Indian Philosophy 25 (2): 181–256. http://dx.doi.org/
10.1023/A:1004291223455
— 2007. ‘Good and Evil in Indian Buddhism: The Five Sins of Immediate Retribution.’ Journal of
Indian Philosophy 35 (3): 253–86. http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10781-006-9005-1
Tawney, Charles Henry (trans.) 1895. The Kathākośa; or Treasury of Stories. Oriental Translation
Fund. New Series II. London: Royal Asiatic Society.
Upādhye, Ādinātha Neminātha (ed.). 1943. Śrī-Hariṣeṇācārya-kṛta Bṛhatkathākośa. Baṃbaī: Bhāratīya
Vidyā Bhavana.
Waldschmidt, Ernst (ed.). 1932. Bruchstücke buddhistischer Sūtras aus dem zentralasiatischen Sanskrit-
kanon. Kleinere Sanskrit-Texte 4. Leipzig: Deutsche Morgenländische Gesellschaft.
— 1950–1951. Das Mahāparinirvāṇasūtra: Text in Sanskrit und Tibetisch, verglichen mit dem Pāli nebst
einer Übersetzung der chinesischen Entsprechung im Vinaya der Mūlasarvāstivādins, auf Grund von
Turfan-Handschriften herausgegeben und bearbeitet. Teil I-III. Berlin: Akademie-Verlag.
— 1952–1962. Das Catuṣpariṣatsūtra: Eine kanonische Lehrschrift über die Begründung der buddhist-
ischen Gemeinde. Text in Sanskrit und Tibetisch, verglichen mit dem Pāli nebst einer Übersetzung der
chinesischen Entsprechung im Vinaya der Mūlasarvāstivādins, auf Grund von Turfan-Handschriften
herausgegeben und bearbeitet. Teil I-III. Berlin: Akademie-Verlag.
Wiley, Kristi L. 2003. ‘The Story of King Śreṇika: Binding and Modifications of Āyu Karma.’ In Olle
Qvarnström (ed.), Jainism and Early Buddhism: Essays in Honor of Padmanabh S. Jaini: 337–58. Fre-
mont, CA: Asian Humanities Press.
— 2004. Historical Dictionary of Jainism. Lanham, MD: The Scarecrow Press.
— 2006. ‘Ahiṃsā and Compassion in Jainism.’ In Peter Flügel (ed.), Studies in Jaina History and Cul-
ture: Disputes and Dialogues: 438–55. London: Routledge.
Williams, Robert (ed. and trans.). 1959. Two Prakrit Versions of the Maṇipati-carita. London: Luzac &
Co.
Woodward, Frank Lee (trans.). 1932. The Book of the Gradual Sayings (Anguttara-Nikāya) or More-Num-
bered Suttas. Vol. I (Ones, Twos, Threes). Reprint: London: The Pali Text Society, 1979.
Woodward, Frank Lee (ed.). 1929–1937. Sārattha-ppakāsinī: Buddhaghosa’s Commentary on the
Saṃyutta-Nikāya. 3 vols. Reprint: London: The Pali Text Society, 1977.
Wu, Juan. 2012. ‘From Perdition to Awakening: A Study of Legends of the Salvation of the Patri-
cide Ajātaśatru in Indian Buddhism.’ PhD dissertation, Cardiff University.

Wu-Violence Virtue and Spiritual Liberation A Preliminary Survey of Buddhist and Jaina Stories of Future Rebirths of Shrenika Bimbisara and Kunika Ajatashatru PDF

Încărcat de

Informații document

Titlu original

Drepturi de autor

Formate disponibile

Partajați acest document

Partajați sau inserați document

Opțiuni de partajare

Vi se pare util acest document?

Este necorespunzător acest conținut?

Drepturi de autor:

Formate disponibile

Wu-Violence Virtue and Spiritual Liberation A Preliminary Survey of Buddhist and Jaina Stories of Future Rebirths of Shrenika Bimbisara and Kunika Ajatashatru PDF

Încărcat de

Drepturi de autor:

Formate disponibile

Religions of South Asia 8.

2 (2014) 149-179 ISSN (print) 1751-2689

Violence, Virtue and Spiritual Liberation:

KEYWORDS: Ajātaśatru/Kūṇika; Bimbisāra/Śreṇika; karma; rebirth; soteriology.

© Equinox Publishing Ltd 2014.

Future Rebirths of Bimbisāra and

Bimbisāra’s Spiritual Attainment in This Life and His Ensuing Rebirth(s)

In Buddhist literature, the image of King Bimbisāra is overall very positive. He

© Equinox Publishing Ltd 2014.

passing his ultimate liberation. The scarcity of the information on Bimbisāra’s

© Equinox Publishing Ltd 2014.

© Equinox Publishing Ltd 2014.

Ajātaśatru’s Future Rebirths and Eventual Awakening

In Buddhist traditions, Ajātaśatru is said to have killed his father Bimbisāra

© Equinox Publishing Ltd 2014.

the end of the Sāmaññaphala-sutta referring to the religious insight Ajātasattu

© Equinox Publishing Ltd 2014.

© Equinox Publishing Ltd 2014.

According to this prophecy, Ajātaśatru is supposed to be reborn in the Avīci

© Equinox Publishing Ltd 2014.

© Equinox Publishing Ltd 2014.

include in footnotes the counterparts in the fragmentary Sanskrit version of

© Equinox Publishing Ltd 2014.

The Buddha’s statements above provide us with a picture of Ajātaśatru’s path

© Equinox Publishing Ltd 2014.

Future Rebirths of Śreṇika and Kūṇika in Jaina Sources

Kūṇika’s Death and Next Birth in Hell

The Jainas spoke of Śreṇika’s suicide instead of Kūṇika’s patricide. According

© Equinox Publishing Ltd 2014.

At least five post-canonical Śvetāmbara texts give accounts of Kūṇika’s

© Equinox Publishing Ltd 2014.

© Equinox Publishing Ltd 2014.

In both versions, Kūṇika is portrayed in a negative light. Overwhelmed by

Śreṇika’s Future Rebirths and Eventual Tīrthaṅkarahood

The earliest extant Śvetāmbara source that contains detailed information on

© Equinox Publishing Ltd 2014.

© Equinox Publishing Ltd 2014.

© Equinox Publishing Ltd 2014.

Seṇiya visuddha-sammatta-dhārao | tammi narayāo uvvaṭṭiya Bharahe Ussappiṇī-samae || hosi

© Equinox Publishing Ltd 2014.

Largely the same story also appears in the Triṣaṣṭiśalākāpuruṣacarita of Hema-

© Equinox Publishing Ltd 2014.

According to this account, it is through meeting Mahāvīra and hearing

© Equinox Publishing Ltd 2014.

© Equinox Publishing Ltd 2014.

© Equinox Publishing Ltd 2014.

With regard to Ajātaśatru/Kūṇika, there are also two basic differences

© Equinox Publishing Ltd 2014.

typal bodhisattva such as Mañjuśrī), or through hearing Buddhist teachings.

© Equinox Publishing Ltd 2014.

of Ajātaśatru, whose liberation relies almost entirely on the intervention of

The research for this article was supported by a Grant-in-Aid (Number 24

A Note on Citation and Technical Details

© Equinox Publishing Ltd 2014.

© Equinox Publishing Ltd 2014.

Sv Sumaṅgalavilāsinī (Rhys Davids and Carpenter 1886)

© Equinox Publishing Ltd 2014.

© Equinox Publishing Ltd 2014.

© Equinox Publishing Ltd 2014.

Śāha, Subodhacandra Nānālāla (ed.). 1977. Triṣaṣṭiśalākāpuruṣacaritam Mahākāvyam. Daśamaṃ

© Equinox Publishing Ltd 2014.

S-ar putea să vă placă și