![]() Paying heartiest obeisance to these five great Souls helps the devotee annihilates all his sins and is highly benevolent to the Soul. These five collectively known as the five excellent Souls make up of five padas. The Mantra has two Lords: – Arihantas and Siddhas, three Gurus: – Acharya, Upadhyaya and Sadhu. We call the above as the Namaskar Mantra because all Jains bow to all the padas mentioned above with mind, body and speech and honor it highly. The above five worships are destroyer of all sins and this is the first beneficent among all benefactions. I bow to the Upadhyays who are next to the head.ĥ. I bow to the Acharyas, the heads of the four – fold order.Ĥ. I bow to the Siddhas, the bodiless liberated souls.ģ. I bow to the Arihantas (with body), the omniscient (knowing everything).Ģ. According to the Shvetämbara text the Mahänishitha, the Namaskära Mantra was composed in the form of a sootra (present form) by the disciples of Mahävira but its main essence was derived from the words of Mahävira himself.ġ. 3, page 247, the Namaskära Mantra was composed by aDigambara ächärya, Pushpadanta. If this incident did in fact occur then, the Namaskära Mantra was in existence during the 9th Century BC.Īccording to the Jainendra Siddhänta Kosha vol. In the incident, Pärshvanätha recites the Namaskära Mantra seeing a snake who was about to die after accidentally being burnt in a fire. The Trishashti Shaläkä Purusha Charitra , which consists of the lives of 63 great personalities, has mentioned an incident in the life of Pärshvanätha. Jain writers were only writing a sentence or two in obeisance to Mahävira1, and not the Namaskära Mantra. Again one cannot deduce that because the Namaskära Mantra was not written at the beginning of any texts, it did not exist. It may be possible that the Namaskära Mantra in it’s present form was composed much later then the general belief of most people. Another inscription discovered from Mathurä says: ‘Namo Arihantänam, Namo Siddhänam’ This one is believed to have been carved in the sixth century AD The Khärvel inscription says: ‘Namo Arihantänam, Namo Savva Siddhänam’. Let us see two more sources which are the inscriptions found on rocks. But then again it is not seen in the earlier scriptures. ![]() Jains believe that the Namaskära mantra is eternal. The answers to these questions may not be found anywhere. The question is therefore: was the Namaskära Mantra composed quite late or is it true that the practice of writing the Namaskära mantra at the beginning of any sacred texts started quite late.? Therefore it seems that the tradition of writing the Namaskära Mantra at the beginning of any texts was developed quite late. The manuscripts of the Kalpa-sootra (which was penned in 453 AD3) are seen with the Namaskära Mantra at the beginning of the main texts. Even most manuscripts of the Nandisootra and the Anuyogadwär (composed after first century AD) also do not have the Namaskära Mantra at the beginning of the texts. ![]() The practice of writing the Namaskära Mantra at the beginning of any text must have been started after around the first century AD. A part of this mantra is seen at the beginning of the Bhagavati Sootra, but is not in the same form as is now generally accepted. The Digambara scriptures like the Samay Sär or the Niyam Sär do not have the Navkära Mantra at the beginning of the text. The text of the Tattvärtha Sootra does not have the Namaskära Mantra at the beginning and this was composed in the first century AD. The Acharänga Sootra and The Suyagdänga do not contain the Namaskära Mantra. It is noteworthy that the Namaskära Mantra is not found in earlier scriptures.
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