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Mahavira (Devanagari: महावीर, ), also known as Vardhamana (Devanagari: वर्धमान, ), was the 24th Tirthankara (Supreme Preacher and Ford Maker) of Jainism. Although the dates and most historical details of his life are uncertain and varies by sect, historians generally consider that he lived during the 6th or 5th century BCE, reviving and reforming a proto-Jain community (which had possibly been founded by Pārśvanātha), and that he was an older contemporary of The Buddha.
Jains regard him as the spiritual successor of the 23rd Tirthankara Parshvanatha. According to traditional legends and hagiography, Mahavira was born in the early 6th century BCE to a royal Kshatriya Jain family of the Nāya tribe. His mother's name was Trishala and his father's name was Siddhartha. According to the second chapter of the Śvētāmbara Ācārāṅga Sūtra, Siddhartha and his family were devotees of Parshvanatha. Mahavira abandoned all worldly possessions at the age of about 30 and left home in pursuit of spiritual awakening, becoming an asceticism. Mahavira practiced intense meditation and severe austerities for twelve and a half years, after which he attained Kevala Jnana (omniscience). He preached for 30 years and attained moksha (liberation) in the 6th century BCE, although the year varies by sect. (Many historians now believe his lifetime was later, by as much as one century, than was stated in tradition.)
Mahavira taught attainment of samyak darshan or self realization ( atma-anubhuti) through the practice of bhedvijnāna, which involves positioning oneself as a pure soul, separate from body, mind and emotions, and being aware of the soul's true nature; and to remain grounded and steadfast in soul's unchanging essence during varying auspicious or inauspicious external circumstances. He also preached that the observance of the vows of ahimsa (non-violence), satya (truth), asteya (non-stealing), brahmacharya (chastity), and aparigraha (non-attachment) are necessary for spiritual liberation. He taught the principles of Anekantavada (many-sided reality): syadvada and nayavada. Mahavira's teachings were compiled by Indrabhuti Gautama (his chief disciple) as the Jain Agamas. The texts, transmitted oral tradition by Jain monks, are believed to have been largely lost by about the 1st century CE.
Mahavira is usually depicted in a sitting or standing meditative posture, with the symbol of a lion beneath him. His earliest iconography is from archaeological sites in the city of Mathura, and is dated from between the 1st century BCE and the 2nd century CE. His birth is celebrated as Mahavir Janma Kalyanak while his nirvana (liberation) and attainment of Kevala jnana (omniscience) by Gautama Swami are observed by Jains as Diwali.
Jains celebrate Mahavir Janma Kalyanak every year on the 13th day of the Indian Calendar month of Chaitra.
According to later Jain texts, Mahavira's childhood name was Vardhamāna ("the one who grows") because of the kingdom's prosperity at the time of his birth. According to the Kalpa Sūtra, he was called Mahavira ("the great hero") by the gods in the Kalpa Sūtra because he remained steadfast in the midst of dangers, fears, hardships and calamities. He is also known as a tirthankara.
It is uncertain when Mahavira was born and when he died. One view is that Mahavira was born in 540BCE and died in 443BCE. According to Buddhist and Jain texts, Buddha and Mahavira are believed to have been contemporaries which is supported by much ancient Buddhist literature.
The Barli Inscription in Prakrit language which was claimed to have been inscribed in 443 BCE (year 84 of the Vira Nirvana Samvat), contains the line Viraya Bhagavate chaturasiti vase, which can be interpreted as "dedicated to Lord Vira in his 84th year", 84 years after the Nirvana of the Mahavira. However, palaeography analysis dates the inscription to the 2nd-1st century BCE, and its interpretation has been disputed. Historians such as D. C. Sircar and S. R. Goyal have disputed that theory that the inscription is dated in the Vira Nirvana Samvat, arguing that this era was first used in the early medieval period, and most probably did not exist in the century following the death of Mahavira.
A firmly-established part of the Jain tradition is that the Vira Nirvana Samvat era began in 527BCE (with Mahavira's nirvana). However, some of the historians argue, "it seems quite clear that, at the time when these lists Jain were put into their present form, the real date of Mahāvīra had already either been forgotten or was at least doubtful," and is connected with "a list of kings and dynasties" which "is absolutely valueless, as it confuses rulers ... and some of these may perhaps have been contemporary, and not successive as they are represented."
The 12th-century Jain scholar Hemachandracharya placed Mahavira in the 6th-5thcentury BCE. According to Jain tradition, the traditional date of 527BCE is accurate; the Buddha was younger than Mahavira and "might have attained nirvana a few years later". The place of his nirvana, Pawapuri in present-day Bihar, is a pilgrimage site for Jains.
On the basis of chronologies in Hemachandra's Pariśiṣṭaparvan, some historians have dated Mahavira's death to ca. 468-467 BCE or 477 BCE. Other historians, who now favor the "Short Chronology" for Gautama Buddha's lifetime (ca. 480-400 BCE), believe that the traditional dates for Mahavira also are too early, by as much as one century, since Mahavira and Buddha were contemporaries. Dundas suggests that Mahavira may have died "around 425 BCE, or a few years after".
According to Jains, Mahavira was born in 599BCE. His birth date falls on the thirteenth day of the rising moon in the month of Chaitra in the Vira Nirvana Samvat calendar era. It falls in March or April of the Gregorian calendar, and is celebrated by Jains as Mahavir Janma Kalyanak.
Kshatriyakund (the place of Mahavira's birth) is traditionally believed to be near Vaishali, an ancient town on the Indo-Gangetic Plain. Its location in present-day Bihar is unclear, partly because of migrations from ancient Bihar for economic and political reasons. According to the "Universal History" in Jain texts, Mahavira underwent many rebirths (total 27 births) before his birth in the 6th-century BCE. They included a denizen of hell, a lion, and a god ( deva) in a heavenly realm just before his last birth as the 24th tirthankara. Svetambara texts state that his embryo first formed in a Brahman woman before it was transferred by Hari-Naigamesin (the divine commander of Indra's army) to the womb of Trishala, Siddhartha's wife. The embryo-transfer legend is not believed by adherents of the Digambara tradition.
Jain texts state that after Mahavira was born, the god Indra came from the heavens along with 56 digkumaries, anointed him, and performed his abhisheka (consecration) on Mount Meru. These events, illustrated in a number of Jain temples, play a part in modern Jain temple rituals. Although the Kalpa Sūtra accounts of Mahavira's birth legends are recited by Svetambara Jains during the annual Paryushana festival, the same festival is observed by the Digambaras without the recitation.
Jain texts portray Mahavira as tall; his height was given as four (6 feet) in the Aupapatika Sutra. According to Jain texts, he was the shortest of the twenty-four tirthankaras; earlier arihants were believed to have been taller, with Neminatha or Aristanemi —the 22nd tirthankara, who lived for 1,000 years—said to have been sixty-five cubits (98feet) in height.
Accounts of Mahavira's nirvana vary among Jain texts, with some describing a simple nirvana and others recounting grandiose celebrations attended by gods and kings. According to the Jinasena's Mahapurana, heavenly beings arrived to perform his funeral rites. The Pravachanasara of Digambara tradition says that only the nails and hair of tirthankaras are left behind; the rest of the body dissolves in the air like camphor. In some texts Mahavira is described, at age 72, as delivering his final preaching over a six-day period to a large group of people. The crowd falls asleep, awakening to find that he has disappeared (leaving only his nails and hair, which his followers cremate).
The Jain Śvētāmbara tradition believes that Mahavira's nirvana occurred in 527 BCE, and the Digambara tradition holds that date of 510 BCE. In both traditions, his jiva (soul) is believed to abide in Siddhashila (the home of liberated souls). Mahavira's Jal Mandir stands at the place where he is said to have attained nirvana ( moksha). Artworks in Jain temples and texts depict his final liberation and cremation, sometimes shown symbolically as a small pyre of sandalwood and a piece of burning camphor.
Vardhamacharitra is a Sanskrit kāvya poem, written by Asaga in 853 CE, which narrates the life of Mahavira. The Kalpa Sūtra is a collection of biographies of tirthankaras, notably Parshvanatha and Mahavira. Samavayanga Sutra is a collection of Mahavira's teachings, and the Ācārāṅga Sūtra recounts his asceticism.
The goal of these principles is to achieve spiritual peace, a better rebirth, or (ultimately) liberation. According to Chakravarthi, these teachings help improve a person's quality of life. However, Paul Dundas writes that Mahavira's emphasis on non-violence and restraint has been interpreted by some Jain scholars to "not be driven by merit from giving or compassion to other creatures, nor a duty to rescue all creatures" but by "continual self discipline": a cleansing of the soul which leads to spiritual development and release.
Mahavira is best remembered in the Indian traditions for his teaching that ahimsa is the supreme moral virtue. He taught that ahimsa covers all living beings, and injuring any being in any form creates bad karma (which affects one's rebirth, future well-being, and suffering). According to Mahatma Gandhi, Mahavira was the greatest authority on ahimsa.
To Mahavira, the metaphysical nature of the universe consists of dravya, jiva, and ajiva (inanimate objects). The jiva is bound to saṃsāra (transmigration) because of karma (the effects of one's actions). Karma, in Jainism, includes actions and intent; it colors the soul ( lesya), affecting how, where, and as what a soul is reborn after death.
According to Mahavira, there is no creator deity and existence has neither beginning nor end. Deities and demons however exist in Jainism, whose jivas are a part of the same cycle of birth and death. The goal of spiritual practice is to liberate the jiva from its karmic accumulation and enter the realm of the , souls who are liberated from rebirth. Enlightenment, to Mahavira, is the consequence of self awareness, self-cultivation and restraint from materialism.
According to Mahavira, this understanding is crucial for attainment of nischay Samyak darshan (experiential self realization). He emphasized that human suffering arises from the false identification of the soul with material objects, including the body and mind. The teachings of bhedvijnān guide an individual to recognize what is truly the self (soul) and what is not, and remain aware of this separation. By distinguishing between the pure soul and the transient elements of life, one can cultivate detachment (vairagya) and move toward liberation (moksha). This was expounded in detail in works of Kundakunda, Haribhadra, Yashovijaya and Shrimad Rajchandra.
Bhedvigyan plays a key role in the progression towards self-realization. It serves as a stepping stone in the process of spiritual awakening, where the aspirant first becomes aware of their mistaken identity with the non-soul as their witness ( bhed-nasti), and later become aware of the existence and true nature of the soul itself ( asti). This process ultimately leads to the direct experience of the soul in a state of pure awareness, destroying karmic attachments.
In Jainism, this knowledge is considered the foundation for developing right belief (samyak darshan) and attaining samyak gyan (omniscience).
Mahavira's anekantavada doctrine is also summarized in Buddhist texts such as the Samaññaphala Sutta (in which he is called Nigantha Nātaputta), and is a key difference between the teachings of Mahavira and those of the Buddha. The Buddha taught the Middle Way, rejecting the extremes of "it is" or "it is not"; Mahavira accepted both "it is" and "it is not", with reconciliation and the qualification of "perhaps".
The Jain Agamas suggest that Mahavira's approach to answering Metaphysics, philosophical questions was a "qualified yes" ( syāt). A version of this doctrine is also found in the Ajivika school of ancient Indian philosophy.
According to Dundas, the anekantavada doctrine has been interpreted by many Jains as "promoting a universal religious tolerance ... plurality ... and ... benign attitude to other ethical, positions"; however, this misreads Jain historical texts and Mahavira's teachings. Mahavira's "many pointedness, multiple perspective" teachings are a doctrine about the nature of reality and human existence, not about tolerating religious positions such as sacrificing animals (or killing them for food) or violence against nonbelievers (or any other living being) as "perhaps right". The five vows for Jain monks and nuns are strict requirements, with no "perhaps". Mahavira's Jainism co-existed with Buddhism and Hinduism beyond the renunciant Jain communities, but each religion was "highly critical of the knowledge systems and ideologies of their rivals".
The digambar sect (the sky-clad, naked mendicant order) believed that a woman is unable to fully practice asceticism and cannot achieve spiritual liberation because of her gender; she can, at best, live an ethical life so she is reborn as a man.
Mahavira had preached about men and women equality. The Svetambaras have interpreted Mahavira's teaching as encouraging both sexes to pursue a mendicant, ascetic life with the possibility of moksha ( kaivalya, spiritual liberation).
Mahavira preached that the nature of existence is cyclic, and the soul is reborn after death in one of the trilokthe heavenly, hellish, or earthly realms of existence and suffering. Humans are reborn, depending on one's karma (actions) as a human, animal, element, microbe, or other form, on earth or in a heavenly (or hellish) realm. Nothing is permanent; everyone (including gods, demons and earthly beings) dies and is reborn, based on their actions in their previous life. Jinas who have reached Kevala Jnana (omniscience) are not reborn; they enter the siddhaloka, the "realm of the perfected ones".
According to Jain tradition, Parshvanatha was a tirthankara born 273 years before Mahavira, which would mean he lived in about the 9th or 8th century BCE. However, "some scholars have suggested that Pārśvanātha and Mahāvīra were actually closer in time than the tradition claims", and that "Pārśva could not have started his ascetic career before the beginning of the sixth century BC" and "may have passed away only a few decades before Vardhamāna i.e., had started his preaching career".
Jain texts suggest that Mahavira's parents were lay devotees of Parshvanatha. When Mahavira revived the Jain community in the 6th century BCE, ahimsa was already an established, strictly observed rule. The followers of Parshvanatha vowed to observe ahimsa; this obligation was part of their caujjama dhamma (Fourfold Restraint).
According to Dundas, Jains believe that the lineage of Parshvanatha influenced Mahavira. Parshvanatha, as the one who "removes obstacles and has the capacity to save", is a popular icon; his image is the focus of Jain temple devotion. Of the 24 tirthankaras, Jain iconography has celebrated Mahavira and Parshvanatha the most; sculptures discovered at the Mathura archaeological site have been dated to the 1stcentury BCE. According to Moriz Winternitz, Mahavira may be considered a reformer of an existing Jain sect known as Niganthas (fetter-less) which was mentioned in early Buddhist texts. The Barli Inscription claimed as dating back to 443 BCE contains the line Viraya Bhagavate chaturasiti vase, which can be interpreted as "dedicated to Lord Vira in his 84th year", but the dating of the inscription is more likely 1st century BCE on palaeography grounds, and its interpretation has been disputed. Historians such as D. C. Sircar and S. R. Goyal have disputed that theory that the inscription is dated in the Vira Nirvana Samvat, arguing that this era was first used in the early medieval period, and most probably did not exist in the century following the death of Mahavira.
Mahavira's teachings were influential. According to Rabindranath Tagore,
An event associated with the 2,500th anniversary of Mahavira's nirvana was held in 1974:
Mahavira's earliest iconography is from archaeological sites in the city of Mathura, dated from the 1stcentury BCE to the 2ndcentury CE. The srivatsa mark on his chest and his dhyana-mudra posture appears in Kushana Empire-era artwork. Differences in Mahavira's depiction between the Digambara and Svetambara traditions appear in the late 5thcentury CE. According to John Cort, the earliest archaeological evidence of Jina iconography with inscriptions precedes its datable texts by over 250 years.
Many images of Mahavira have been dated to the 12th century and earlier; an ancient sculpture was found in a cave in Sundarajapuram, Theni district, Tamil Nadu. K. Ajithadoss, a Jain scholar in Chennai, dated it to the 9th century.
Jivantasvami represents Mahavira as a princely state. The Jina is represented as standing in the kayotsarga pose wearing crown and ornaments.
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