He silently accepted the hair and put it in his purse. The Hindus
stood round the tiger, and the Sinhalese traced mysterious signs
on its forehead. Gulab-Sing continued quietly reading his book.
-------------
The Birza cave, about six miles from Vargaon, is constructed on
the same plan as Karli. The vault-like ceiling of the temple rests
upon twenty-six pillars, eighteen feet high, and the portico on four,
twenty-eight feet high; over the portico are carved groups of horses,
oxen, and elephants, of the most exquisite beauty. The "Hall of
Initiation" is a spacious, oval room, with pillars, and eleven very
deep cells cut in the rock. The Bajah caves are older and more
beautiful. Inscriptions may still be seen showing that all these
temples were built by Buddhists, or, rather, by Jainas. Modern
Buddhists believe in one Buddha only, Gautama, Prince of Kapilavastu
(six centuries before Christ) whereas the Jainas recognize a Buddha
in each of their twenty-four divine teachers (Tirthankaras) the
last of whom was the Guru (teacher) of Gautama. This disagreement
is very embarrassing when people try to conjecture the antiquity
of this or that vihara or chaitya. The origin of the Jaina sect
is lost in the remotest, unfathomed antiquity, so the name of Buddha,
mentioned in the inscriptions, may be attributed to the last of
the Buddhas as easily as to the first, who lived (see Tod's genealogy)
a long time before 2,200 B.
Pages:
103
104
105
106
107
108
109
110
111
112
113
114
115
116
117
118
119
120
121
122
123
124
125
126
127