Dr. Surendra Singhvi
Jain Radiance On The Western Horizon
[05] Earlier Western Knowledge of Jainism
Having said a little about the achievement of Mr. Virchand Raghavaji Gandhi in the west between 1893 and his untimely early death in 1901 we must turn back to consider some of the factors which helped Mr. Gandhi's listeners and readers to understand and respond to the message of Jains. At any time in the nineteenth century, many westerners well versed in European culture would have read and wondered at the stories brought back from ancient India by the Greeks. According to these there were in that far-offland naked philosophers who gave themselves to the solitary, homeless, possessionless life. They could not be coerced - even by Alexander himself. They observed strict continence, ate little and willingly gave themselves to death. The stories are in rather a muddle but if one knows something about Jainism one can recognise specifically Jain features among these holy people, even down to those who received their alms only in their hands and not in bowls. To this day few scholars versed in Indian tore and the western classical languages have bothered to go over these accounts with the care and detail they deserve. Similarly we know that the early Christian fathers and mothers of the Church such as Clement of Alexandria, Jerome of Bethlehem and Ambrose of Milan knew of and were perhaps influenced by Indian ascetics.
In addition, a number of features in early Christian Egyptian monasticism would appear to go back to Indian influences. These could include the teaching of people of Jain background, not only laity, who could use the winds to sail from Kutch to Egypt. Munis could have walked naked and dependent on sins if they chose the seasons and route carefully. Others have suggested that the Jains may have influenced the medieval Cathans. This is indeed quite possible, though the connecting link may be the overlap of Mani's teachings (Mani being considered as the original source of Cathanism) with Jainism. Mani himself would probably have met Jain people.
Travelers' tales began to filter back to Europe and Britain also from medieval Arab sources. The western scholars' usual cursory glance through say Al Biruni and Ibn Battuta, impresses one with Indian mathematicians, technicians and scientists who were not overcommunicative. Would you befriend a scholar working for Mahmud of Ghazni or Muhammad Tuqluk? One also glimpses naked holy persons and self-immolations depicted without distinct and fine details. The Indian rope-trick and sati stories were already abroad. Coming to early Portuguese, Dutch and British times in eastern waters, the early nineteenth century scholar in U.K. or U.S.A. read of a group who had bird hospitals, immensely beautiful temples full of white-clad pilgrims on the hills and holy persons who starved themselves to death when they felt their lifework was done. [9]