Sudharmaswami

Sudharmaswami (Sanskrit: Sudharmāsvāmī or Sudharman; 607 BC – 507 BC) was the fifth ganadhara of Mahavira. All the current Jain acharyas and monks follow his rule.

Sudharmaswami
Sudharma Swami
Personal information
Born	607 BC
Parents	Rajanswami (adoptive father/uncle) Sampurn (father) Prithvidarshyānā (mother)

Life

Sudharmaswami was the spiritual successor of Indrabhuti Gautama in religious order reorganised by Mahavira.[1] He is traditionally dated from 607 to 506 BCE.[2] He is believed in Jain tradition to have obtained omniscience after 12 years in 515 BC.[1] He is believed to have attained nirvana in 507 BC at the age of 100.[1][3] The leadership of religious order was then transferred to Jambuswami who served for 44 years.[1]

For Jains, their scriptures represent the literal words of Mahavira and the other tirthankaras only to the extent that the agama is a series of beginning-less, endless and fixed truths, a tradition without any origin, human or divine, which in this world age has been channelled through Sudharmāsvāmī, the last of Mahavira's disciples to survive.[4]

See also

• Jain monasticism

References

Citations

1. Natubhai Shah 2004, p. 39.
2. Natubhai Shah 2004, p. 41.
3. George 2008, p. 319.
4. Dundas 2002, p. 61.

Sources

• Dundas, Paul (2002) [1992], The Jains (Second ed.), Routledge, ISBN 0-415-26605-X
• George, Vensus A. (2008), Paths to the Divine: Ancient and Indian, XII, The Council for Research in Values and Philosophy, ISBN 978-1-56518-248-6
• Shah, Natubhai (2004) [First published in 1998], Jainism: The World of Conquerors, I, Motilal Banarsidass, ISBN 978-81-208-1938-2