The year was 1290 . A crowd had gathered around a clearing, where broken down pillars marked the presence of an ancient temple, now long gone. A young boy, just 14 years old, leaned against one of those pillars, deep in thought. Then, he began speaking, and the crowd fell silent, listening to his every word. He spoke without any notes, translating the Bhagavat Gita, from Sanskrit, which only the pundits knew, to the language everyone in the village knew and spoke – a variety of Prakrit which developed into the Marathi language. Even as he spoke, one of the men in the audience realized how momentous this event was, and how important this composition would be. He began writing down the words the young boy spoke, and this composition was named by its author and composer, the Bhavartha Deepika – the enlightening meaning (of the Bhagavat Gita). Now, the ancient, holy text, was no longer restricted to the pundits, but accessible to all, understood easily by them, composed as it was, in their...
The fourth cave at Badami is the
only Jain cave among the four. This is also by far the simplest cave, though
there are quite a lot of renditions of the Jain Tirthankars. This was also the
only cave which the school students gave a miss, so it was practically empty! Unfortunately,
this cave seems to get less than its rightful share of eyeballs, so it was dark
and dank. The inner sanctum was so dark that I could see nothing! Our guide didn’t
have a torch, and since it was late in the evening, I managed to get a decent
capture of the sanctum with my camera in the ‘night’ mode!
Related Badami Posts
The sanctum houses an image of
Mahavira….
Outside are many interesting
carvings of Jain Tirthankars….. My knowledge of these is rudimentary, so let me
just take you on a photo-tour…
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| Tirthankars inside the sanctum |
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| More.... look at the remnants of painting inside the sanctum |
These three look almost identical, but when you look close, there are plenty of differences. Sorry, I dont know enough to identify them!
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| Gomateshwara - see the vines climbing up his legs |
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| Parshwanath - with the snake hood |
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| Mahavira - with a devotee |
Our guide attempted to explain
some of these sculptures to us, but without much knowledge of Jainism, much of
it went right over our heads. Samhith especially was completely lost,
unsurprisingly, and he had just one question – Why were none of the Tirthankars
wearing anything? He seemed a bit embarrassed, which is when it struck me why
the cave was empty – the teachers had obviously deemed this cave ‘unsuitable’
for the students!
What hypocrisy we practice in the
name of ‘moral standards’! We allow kids to see programmes and movies which are
much more explicit, yet we fail to allow them to see something which talks of a
higher goal – of being free of all attachments, even to cloth! This was where
our guide came to our rescue, and beautifully explained about the two sects of Jainism
– Digambars,
who believed in letting go of all attachments, and wearing nothing; and Shwetambars
– who also let go of all attachments, but wear only white, unstitched cloth. Explaining
the difference and the greatness of the saints depicted in the cave seemed to
take off some of the embarrassment, and he wondered how they managed to live
like that, wearing nothing, eating very little and meditating all the time! The
sculptures had at last managed to make him understand how difficult it was to
do penance, to meditate, to let go of attachments and think only of God. He listens
to these things in stories all the time, but I think it was here that he actually
got a glimpse of what it really was like! There is a long way to go before he
really understands, but I believe we just started our journey towards true
spirituality!
The fourth cave at Badami was the
last we visited on this trip, but I think it reinforced my belief that nothing
is too great to be explained to children, that there is nothing they can’t
really understand, if explained at their level. But most of all, it reinforced
my belief that if we want to preserve our heritage for our descendants, we need
to make our children aware of it first, and that it is never too early to
begin!
Badami Factfile
- Location: Badami is located in Karnataka, 30 Kms from Bagalkot and 589 Km from Bangalore
- Nearest Airport: Belgaum, 190 Km
- Nearest Railway station: Hubli, 100 Km
- Accomodation: There are plenty of options for staying in Badami, but most of them are lodges and low to medium end hotels. The best is certainly the Karnataka Tourism hotel Maurya Chalukya
- Around Badami:
- Bijapur – 125 Km
- Aihole – 46 Km
- Pattadakkal – 29 Km
- Hospet – 190 Km
Related Badami Posts
- Images from Badami
- Badami Fort
- Badami Cave Temples Part 1
- Badami Cave Temples Part 2
- Badami Cave Temples Part 3
Very interesting series of posts. This is definitely a must visit place.
ReplyDeleteIt was really a wonderful journey as I have not seen ancient sites in Karnataka barring some in and around Bangaluru. I endorse your views contained in the concluding para. Have a nice week end.
ReplyDeleteThanks Pradeepa!
ReplyDeleteWow , nicely presented .
ReplyDeleteI believe Badami can be a world class destination if they spruce up the place, it is worth staying at Badami. We preferred to stay at Aihole which really serene, only one guest house is available there. It is like taking a chance. Jainism was subject to more vandalism in parts of south India unfortunately. I happened to meet Digamber priests at Kanheri caves some years back, and surprisingly they were talking Kannada, we exchanged good wishes. Admire their living philosophy
ReplyDeleteThere must be more around waiting to be discovered.
ReplyDeleteGreat pics.
Awesome historical art! awesome pictures and presentation too! nice one's again.
ReplyDeleteJust came from Badami and agree with you that school children should be handled more sensibly as both they and monkeys harassed us there. What we did not understand there, your photos and descriptions have done that , and now I feel my trip is actually completed after reading your 4 parts, thanks a TON !
ReplyDelete