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JAIN ART AND ARCHITECTURE
Edited
By Mr. Amar T. Salgia
The
first principle of all art or architecture is the transformation of ideas
into a visible object or symbolic expression. Architecture further serves
as a kind of history. It is a standing and living historical record,
providing a more vivid and lasting picture of a cultural tradition than
conventional written history does. An understanding of the motivation
behind Jain art and architecture is an important prerequisite for the
serious student of art. A.N. Upadhye surmises this motivation in the
following from Jain Art and Architecture:
"The
Jain ethic aims at improving oneself by eradicating one's attachment and
aversion, which, in other forms are the four passions of anger, greed, ego
and deceit. If these are brought under control, then the eternal soul is
on the path of becoming paramatman, i.e., one evolves oneself to the
higher spiritual status.... Yearning for wealth and pleasures must be
subordinated to Dharma, religious attitude, which takes one to salvation,
the liberation from all karmas. The worship of the Jina involves the
adoption of a number of virtues, to the best of one's ability and honesty,
such as non-violence, truthfulness, non-stealing, celibacy, and
posessionlessness. "Most of these ethical concepts are reflected, in
some form or other, in Jain art and architecture.... Jain pieces of art
aim at elevating our spirit; they inspire religious values; and they
present, in concrete form, the philosophical concepts and rules of conduct
laid down in Jainism. They satisfy the yearning spirit to identify itself
and evolve into the higher spirit which is characterized by infinite knowledge, perception, strength and bliss." And as with its
philosophy, Jain symbolism, manifested in its arts and architectures,
bears awesome peculiarities.
Much has been written in the twentieth
century about Indian art and architecture, but the aforementioned depth of
philosophical conviction which Jain art and architecture are intended to
convey, has generally been overlooked. To a limited extent, however,
observations of the bulk of Indian art can be applied to Jain art as well.
V.A. Smith in his History of Fine Arts in India and Ceylon writes that
"Hindu Art, including Jain and Buddhist in the comprehensive, is the
real Indian Art. The special feature of Jain art lies in the fact that it
shows the relative position of natural objects with great fineness. It is
sometimes called 'conventionalistic', but that is true of all arts devoted
to religious subjects." In the opinion of Colonel Tod, "[The
Jains'] arts, like their religion, were of a character quite distinct from
those of [the Hindus]. The temple of Mahavira, the last of their
twenty-four apostles, at Nadole (Rajasthan) is a very fine piece of
architecture. Its vaulted roof is a perfect model of the most ancient
style of dome in the East, probably invented anterior to the Romans."
In a chapter on "Jain Architecture and Literature" in The Heart
of Jainism, the missionary Margaret Stevenson writes, "The earliest
Jain architects seem to have used wood as their chief building
material." Lack of supporting evidence, however, hinders scholarly
consideration of this notion. As far as the existing materials can evince,
by the fifth century, B.C., when its primal homeland of modern Bihar and
Uttar Pradesh had become Sanskritized, Jainism was widespread among the
middle class. Its lay followers, the Shravakas and Shravikas, were mostly
engaged in commerce and academics. Thus, the architects and artisans
employed by the lay Jains came primarily from socio-economic classes
engaged solely in such trades. In order to allow permanency to their
religious sanctuaries and objects of worship, they invariably used stone
and metal. More recent discoveries of the remains of many Jain temples,
built centuries before the Christian era, further confirms the fact that
the earliest Jain architecture was not limited to wood.
As for the
antiquity of Jain architecture, the excavations of Kankali Tilla, near
Mathura, establish beyond doubt that the erection of Jain stupas took
place several centuries before the Christian era. According to some
Western scholars, these structures are perhaps the oldest standing
buildings in the modern land of India. Modern and medieval Jains have been
the most prolific temple builders in Western India. The famous Jain
temples atop Mt. Abu (modern Indian state of Rajasthan) are triumphs of
architecture. The intricacy and richness of their carvings are truly
unsurpassed in the world. The great Jain pilgrimage in the Shatrunjay
Hills near Palitana (state of Gujarat), sometimes called the "City of
Temples", is an imposing edifice. Its close, systematic grouping of
buildings, given dramatic changes in altitude and very limited spaces, is
another peculiarity of Jain architecture.
In southern India, there exist
several Jain columns which Colonel Tod noted as being "of a
remarkably pleasing design. They are a wonder of light, elegant, highly
decorated stone-work, and nothing can surpass the stately grace of these
beautiful pillars whose proportions and adaptations to surrounding scenery
are always perfect and whose richness of decoration never offends. In the
whole range of Indian Art, there is nothing perhaps equal to the Kanara
Jain pillars in taste."
Numerous cave-temples have been discovered in
different parts of the Indian subcontinent, West and South. The Jain caves
at Ellora (state of Maharashtra) form a series by themselves and contain
elaborate frescoes and other architectural works. Griffiths writes in the
introduction of his well-known work Ajanta, "The Jains excavated some
five or six extensive works which form a very important group of caves;
one of the largest and most elaborate, the Indra Sabha, being about 90
feet deep, 80 feet wide, and 14 feet high. There are a number of ancient
Jain caves in Orissa on hills known as Khandgiri, Udaigiri, and Nilgiri,
dating as far back as the second century, B.C."
A number of salient
ascetic ideals expressed in Jain and Buddhist sculpture are similar, and
modern art historians have often mistaken images of the Buddhas and Jain
Tirthankaras for one another. The images of Jain Tirthankaras are
generally seated in the meditative padmasana position (the "lotus
posture"), and sometimes in the standing kayotsarga posture (the
"body abondoning" pose), or in ardhapadmasana (the "half
lotus"). The Shvetambar laity has created a unique class of
metal-cast images known as panchatirthis, or "five holies". The
central images on these artefacts consist of any of the twenty-four
Tirthankaras in the padmasana pose; two standing, kayotsarga figures
appear on each side of the middle image; and two more padmasana images are
formed on either side, above the same kayotsarga figures.
Other prominent
themes within Indian Jain art include celestial beings, or angels, as
musicians and votaries: some adoring the omniscient Tirthankaras, some
waving chamaras, and some in prayer, kneeling or standing with folded
hands, etc. One also encounters images of saluting elephants, carrying
water-pots in their trunks, pouring at the feet of a kayotsarga
Tirthankara figure, on either side. Among the Digambar Jain temples in
southern India, the enormous statues at Shravana Belagola (state of
Karnataka), Karkala, Yemur, and Canara are the largest monolithic,
free-standing statues in the world. The tallest one, of Lord Bahubali (at
Shravana Belagola, completed in 981 A.D.), is over 57 feet high and was
carved from a single block of granite.
The place of Jain paintings among
the world's treasury of fine arts is also of importance. A special feature
of Jain painting lies in the drift and quality of its lines. Line is so
finely drawn in the some Jain schools of painting that few other art
traditions bear comparison with it. (It has been demonstrated that the
Chinese technique for creating powerful lines was borrowed from India;
perhaps time will produce evidence that the Chinese may have learned the
skill from Jains artisans.) Jain paintings generally depict important
historical events, such as the lives and deeds of Tirthankaras, ascetics
and monarchs, or pilgrimage centers, or illustrations pertaining to Jain
philosophy and cosmology. Since they sustain a sanctity of their own in
finished form, such works of art were preserved with great veneration in
both temples and homes.
The Jains have also been keen on illustrating
religious texts with miniature paintings whose renditions of man and
nature also bear a unique style and taste. Coomarswami, in his "Notes
on the Jain Art", writes, "The Jain paintings are not only very
important for the students of Jain iconography and archaeology, and not
only are they significant for their illustrations of costume, manners and
customs, but they are of equal or greater interest as being the oldest
known Indian paintings on paper." The Nahar family collection of
manuscripts of the Kalpa Sutra (a revered text dating back to the fourth
century, B.C.), which deals with the lives of the Tirthankaras and ascetic
conduct, contains exquisite miniatures which have been gaining the
attention of modern art critics. Their interesting changes in drapery,
posture and colour, as well as their peculiar stylizations, are quite
striking to the average, unacquainted observer.
The Moghul period of
miniature painting significantly influenced Jain miniature art. In fact,
it was only in that later epoch that paintings of buildings, scenery, and
portraits become prevalent throughout the subcontinent.
A Note on the Art
of the Indus Valley Civilization (c. 3000 - 1500 B.C.)
All of the known
and catalogued works of art and architecture that unmistakably bear Jain
authorship date back no earlier than the fifth century, B.C. However,
seals and icons recovered from the earliest Indus Valley cities depict
rather Jain-like scenes and ascetic ideals. In Oriental Mythology, the
renowned scholar Joseph Campbell made note of several Indus seals which
depict scenes reminiscent of Jain penance and meditation, as well as Jain
art's incorporation of animal figures. John Koller remarks that
"indeed, it is tempting to identify the Jain way with the Indus
people, for animal emblems associated with the Tirthankaras are
reminiscent of those depicted on Indus seals; the Jain practice of yoga
recalls the lotus-postured figure on some of the Indus seals; and the
older Jain sculptures strongly resemble nude terra cotta figures found in
the Indus Valley. Although Mahavira and Parshva [the twenty-third and
twenty-fourth Tirthankaras, respectively] are both thought to have lived
in the Ganges, rather than the Indus Valley, it is possible that their
predecessors lived in the Indus Valley and migrated ahead of the
approaching Aryans."
Excavations have produced significant evidence
for the fact that the ancient Indus inhabitants lived primarily in
distinct mercantile communities, separated from and competing with one
another, often in the same cities. Since the civilization's rediscovery in
the early 1920's, several groups have alleged that the greater religious
identity of the Indus people was "Hindu", "Vedic", or
"Shaivite", or "Jain", etc. A much-scrutinized seal
unearthed from the ancient city of Harappa depicts a man wearing a horned
headdress, sitting in a yogic posture and surrounded by animals. Western
and Hindu scholars appear to have unilaterally christened it "Pashupati"
(an image of the god Shiva as "lord of beasts"), while Jain
scholars have, based on observations similar to Campbell's and Koller's,
identified the same image as that of the first Tirthankara, Lord Rishabha.
Such conclusions pertaining to individual artefacts, however, are
speculatory at best. For the true meaning of seals such as this shall be
discernible only when a credible decipherment is developed for the script
which appears on them.
Together, evidence from within the Brahmanic
tradition, coupled with the entire body of known artifacts from the Indus
cities, vividly suggest that the Indus Valley civilization saw the
coexistence of three religious currents: (1) a non-Vedic religion centered
about asceticism (possibly linked with the northeastern Shramanic
traditions, of which Jainism was one); (2) a non-Vedic religion centered
about fertility and nature-worship, (probably linked to the Semitic
religions of Mesopotamia); and (3) a proto-Vedic, Indo-Aryan religion,
geographically centered about the northern tributaries of the Indus river.
Thus, while a Jain or Shramanic ideological presence within the Indus
Valley civilization is likely, its only known physical manifestations have
been limited to themes expressed in the civilizations's abundant seals and
figurines.
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Information Courtesy :
Mr. Pravin K. Shah
Chairperson JAINA Education Committee
Federation of Jain Associations in North America
509 Carriage Woods Circle Raleigh, NC 27607-3969 USA
Email - Pkshah1@attglobal.net Telephone and fax 919-859-4994
Websites - www.jaina.org and www.jainism.org
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Mail to : Ahimsa
Foundation
www.jainsamaj.org
R301002
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