Interlude B: Alternative Narratives - Jain and Buddhist Reinterpretations

This chapter is part of the book The Sacred Editors: Hinduism.

"To challenge a text is to read it. To rewrite it is to claim its authority."

Pāṭaliputra, around 150 BCE. The monsoon rains drum steadily against the wooden shutters of a Buddhist monastery's scriptorium, where the scent of wet earth mingles with the sharp smell of fresh ink and palm leaves. In the main copying hall, several monks work quietly on different manuscripts, their styluses scratching rhythmically against prepared writing surfaces. The atmosphere is one of disciplined concentration, broken only by the occasional whispered consultation between scribes.

Brother Ānanda, a young monk from Kosala with an exceptional memory for narrative details, carefully unrolls a birch-bark manuscript that arrived the previous week from a Jain upāśraya (community center) in Mathura. The text contains verses that sound remarkably familiar—stories of great warriors, cosmic battles, and divine interventions that echo the Hindu epics he learned during his youth. Yet as he reads more carefully, something fundamental has shifted in these familiar narratives.

The great battle between the Kauravas and Pāṇḍavas still unfolds across the plains of Kurukṣetra, but it concludes not with Krishna's divine revelation about duty and cosmic order, but with profound moral ambiguity about the consequences of violence. Krishna himself appears not as the supreme deity offering spiritual instruction, but as a flawed political strategist whose tactical brilliance cannot overcome the karmic weight of advocating warfare. Most startling of all, Rāma—the paragon of righteous kingship in Hindu tradition—faces sharp criticism for his treatment of forest ascetics and his resort to deception in defeating Rāvaṇa.

Ānanda pauses, recognizing that he holds in his hands a Jain reinterpretation of India's most beloved epic narratives—stories that honor the same cultural heroes while completely transforming their moral significance according to Jain principles of non-violence (ahiṁsā) and spiritual liberation through ethical perfection.

Across the courtyard in the teaching hall, the monastery's senior preceptor, Bhikkhu Kassapa, delivers his daily lecture to a gathering of monks and lay disciples. Today he addresses the relationship between Buddhist and Hindu philosophical claims, particularly the fundamental disagreement about the nature of personal identity. "The Hindu teachers speak eloquently of ātman (eternal self)," he explains, his voice carrying clearly through the humid air. "We speak instead of anattā (no-self). They seek to realize the true self; we seek to understand that no such self ultimately exists. Yet both traditions share the recognition that ordinary consciousness involves suffering, and both seek liberation from that suffering through disciplined spiritual practice."

The scribe recording Kassapa's words nods thoughtfully as he transcribes this nuanced engagement with Hindu thought—neither wholesale rejection nor uncritical acceptance, but careful analysis that acknowledges shared concerns while maintaining doctrinal distinctiveness. Another voice enters the vast archive of subcontinental religious discourse, contributing to conversations that will continue for centuries.¹

Sacred Authority in a Competitive Marketplace

In the complex religious landscape of ancient and classical India, sacred authority was never monopolized by any single tradition. The evolving Hindu textual corpus—with its Vedic foundations, epic elaborations, and philosophical innovations—existed within a vibrant ecosystem of competing religious communities that engaged its content with sophisticated combinations of reverence, critique, and creative adaptation.

Jain and Buddhist thinkers rarely accepted Vedic literature as divinely authoritative or philosophically conclusive. Yet they did not simply ignore these influential texts or dismiss them as irrelevant to their own spiritual concerns. Instead, they developed complex strategies of engagement that involved repurposing Hindu narratives, recasting epic characters according to their own ethical frameworks, and constructing parallel canonical structures that mimicked Hindu textual organization while supporting radically different theological conclusions.

This process of creative reinterpretation represents far more than passive cultural borrowing or simple religious polemic. It constituted a form of "editorial subversion" that demonstrated sophisticated understanding of how textual authority operates in religious communities. By appropriating familiar narrative frameworks while transforming their moral and metaphysical implications, Jain and Buddhist authors claimed cultural legitimacy for their own traditions while challenging the theological foundations of Hindu thought.²

The resulting corpus of alternative narratives reveals the thoroughly contested nature of sacred authority in South Asian civilization. Rather than accepting any single tradition's claim to possess exclusive access to ultimate truth, the subcontinental religious landscape encouraged ongoing dialogue, debate, and creative reinterpretation that enriched all participating communities. Understanding these alternative perspectives illuminates both the distinctive features of Hindu textual development and the broader cultural dynamics that shaped religious expression throughout the region.

Jain Retellings: Moral Transformation Through Narrative Appropriation

Jain literature developed perhaps the most systematic approach to reinterpreting Hindu epic and mythological materials according to distinctive ethical and cosmological principles. Rather than creating entirely original narrative traditions, Jain authors frequently adopted the character lists, plot structures, and cultural settings of familiar Hindu stories while fundamentally transforming their moral significance and spiritual implications.

The Jain Rāmāyaṇa tradition exemplifies this sophisticated approach to narrative reinterpretation. Vimalasūri's Paumacariya (composed around the 4th century CE) presents a version of Rāma's story that honors the cultural significance of these beloved characters while completely reconceptualizing their ethical significance according to Jain principles.³ In this telling, Rāma emerges as a virtuous king who ultimately embraces non-violence and renounces worldly power, but it is his brother Lakṣmaṇa—not Rāma himself—who bears the karmic burden of killing Rāvaṇa. Sītā's trials and tribulations are reframed not as tests of wifely purity and devotion, but as moral illustrations demonstrating the spiritual benefits of truthfulness (satya), non-violence (ahiṁsā), and steadfast commitment to ethical principles even under extreme duress.

This narrative transformation serves multiple religious and cultural functions simultaneously. It acknowledges the profound cultural importance of the Rāma story within South Asian civilization while demonstrating that these beloved characters can support Jain rather than Hindu spiritual values. It provides Jain communities with emotionally satisfying epic literature that connects them to broader cultural traditions without requiring acceptance of Hindu theological claims. Most significantly, it illustrates how apparent conflicts between religious duty and ethical perfection can be resolved through deeper commitment to non-violence and spiritual liberation.

Similar patterns appear in Jain treatments of Mahābhārata materials. Jinasena's 9th-century Harivaṃśa Purāṇa retells the Krishna story within a framework that emphasizes the tragic consequences of political involvement and military violence.⁴ Rather than celebrating Krishna's strategic brilliance or divine interventions, this version traces how his engagement with worldly power ultimately prevents him from achieving liberation in that lifetime, sometimes depicting him dying a painful death as karmic retribution for his role in promoting warfare. The five Pāṇḍava brothers achieve spiritual success not through victory in battle followed by heavenly reward, but through eventual renunciation of worldly achievement and dedicated pursuit of ascetic liberation.

These Jain reinterpretations operate according to consistent hermeneutical principles that reveal sophisticated theological reasoning. As Phyllis Granoff observes, "Jain authors carved space for their own religious vision by inhabiting familiar Hindu narrative forms, then quietly transforming them from within according to their own ethical and soteriological priorities."⁵ The resulting literature demonstrates that cultural continuity and religious distinctiveness need not be mutually exclusive, but can coexist through creative interpretive strategies that honor shared heritage while maintaining doctrinal integrity.

Buddhist Engagements: Philosophical Dialogue and Creative Appropriation

Buddhist approaches to Hindu textual materials reveal different strategies of engagement that reflect Buddhism's distinctive philosophical concerns and institutional development. Rather than systematically retelling Hindu epic narratives, Buddhist literature more frequently engaged Hindu ideas through philosophical critique, comparative analysis, and selective appropriation of useful concepts or practices.

Early Buddhist texts often position themselves in explicit dialogue with Vedic ritualism and Upaniṣadic speculation. The Buddha is regularly portrayed as challenging brahmanical claims about the spiritual efficacy of fire sacrifices, the ultimate authority of Vedic revelation, and the social legitimacy of caste hierarchies. The Tevijja Sutta of the Dīgha Nikāya offers a characteristic example of this approach, using an extended metaphor to critique Vedic ritual practice: "If a man standing on this shore of a river wishes to reach the far shore, will he arrive there by calling out 'Come here, far shore! Come to me!'? What do you think? Would the far shore come to him?"⁶ This passage positions Buddhist meditative practice not as a complete rejection of Hindu spiritual goals, but as a more effective method for achieving the liberation that Hindu practitioners also seek.

However, Buddhist engagement with Hindu materials was never limited to critique or rejection. Particularly in Mahāyāna developments, Buddhist authors demonstrated remarkable creativity in appropriating and adapting Hindu philosophical concepts, ritual techniques, and symbolic systems according to their own distinctive theological frameworks. The concept of tathāgatagarbha (Buddha-nature) that emerged in texts like the Tathāgatagarbha Sūtra bears striking resemblances to Upaniṣadic discussions of ātman and brahman, while maintaining crucial differences about the ultimate nature of personal identity and cosmic reality.⁷

Tantric Buddhism represents perhaps the most extensive Buddhist appropriation of Hindu religious materials, adopting complex iconographic systems, elaborate ritual procedures, and sophisticated philosophical frameworks that often exceeded their Hindu sources in complexity and systematic development. The Guhyasamāja Tantra and other Buddhist tantric texts employ Sanskrit terminology, ritual structures, and symbolic systems derived from Śaiva and Śākta traditions while integrating them into distinctively Buddhist soteriological frameworks focused on the realization of emptiness (śūnyatā) and compassionate engagement with suffering beings.

This pattern of creative appropriation reveals sophisticated Buddhist understanding of how religious authority operates in competitive cultural environments. Rather than rejecting Hindu sacred vocabulary and symbolic systems as inherently corrupt or spiritually useless, Buddhist authors frequently demonstrated that these materials could be more effectively employed within Buddhist rather than Hindu interpretive frameworks. The result was a form of religious dialogue that challenged Hindu theological claims not only through direct critique but through creative transformation and adaptive reinterpretation.

Parallel Canonical Structures and Competing Claims

The development of distinctive Jain and Buddhist canonical traditions reveals how alternative religious communities could simultaneously challenge and validate the model of sacred textual authority that Hindu traditions had established. Both Jainism and Buddhism developed elaborate canonical structures—the Jain Āgamas and Buddhist Tripiṭaka—that mirror important features of Vedic textual organization while supporting completely different theological and ethical conclusions.

These alternative canons employed many of the same preservation strategies that characterized Hindu textual transmission: oral recitation by specialized communities, monastic institutional support, systematic commentary and interpretation, and hierarchical classification of texts according to different levels of authority and spiritual significance. The Jain tradition developed its own categories of canonical and post-canonical literature, its own lineages of authoritative teachers and commentators, and its own methods for handling textual variants and interpretive disputes. Similarly, Buddhist communities created elaborate systems for classifying sutras, vinaya regulations, and abhidharma analyses according to their relative importance and authentic transmission.⁸

This structural similarity created interesting dynamics of both competition and mutual validation within the broader South Asian religious landscape. Each tradition claimed to preserve the most authentic and effective path to liberation, while employing organizational and preservational methods that implicitly acknowledged the cultural authority of textual learning and systematic religious instruction. The very existence of alternative canonical traditions demonstrated that sacred authority could be successfully claimed and maintained by communities that rejected Hindu theological foundations, while the structural similarities between these canons revealed shared assumptions about how religious truth should be preserved and transmitted across generations.

These parallel developments had profound implications for how Hindu communities understood their own textual traditions and religious authority. The existence of sophisticated Jain and Buddhist alternatives meant that Hindu claims about Vedic supremacy or epic authority could no longer be taken for granted but required active defense and creative adaptation. This competitive pressure contributed to the theological innovations and institutional developments that characterized later Hindu tradition, including the emergence of systematic philosophical schools, the elaboration of devotional movements, and the creation of increasingly inclusive approaches to spiritual practice and religious community.

What Alternative Dominance Might Have Created

The sophisticated alternative textual traditions developed by Jain and Buddhist communities were never merely academic exercises but represented genuine possibilities for different forms of religious and cultural development within South Asian civilization. Examining scenarios where these alternatives achieved greater prominence illuminates both the contingent nature of Hindu textual dominance and the range of spiritual and intellectual possibilities that remained unexplored or marginalized.

A Non-Violence Centered Ethical Culture

Had Jain reinterpretations of epic materials achieved broader cultural acceptance, South Asian civilization might have developed around fundamentally different ethical priorities that emphasized non-violence, environmental protection, and systematic attention to the welfare of all sentient beings. The Jain transformation of heroic narratives to support ascetic rather than martial ideals could have created cultural traditions that celebrated spiritual achievement over political power, philosophical insight over military conquest, and ecological harmony over material accumulation.

Paul Dundas argues that Jain ethical principles, if they had achieved broader cultural implementation, could have produced "a civilization oriented toward minimizing harm rather than maximizing power, where heroism was measured by spiritual achievement rather than worldly success."⁹ This alternative development might have created very different approaches to governance, economic activity, and social organization that prioritized sustainability and compassion over expansion and competition.

Buddhist-Influenced Philosophical Synthesis

The Buddhist emphasis on systematic philosophical analysis, logical reasoning, and empirical investigation could have created intellectual traditions more similar to Greek philosophical development if these approaches had gained broader acceptance within Indian educational institutions. Buddhist logical traditions associated with figures like Nāgārjuna and Dignāga demonstrated sophisticated approaches to epistemology, metaphysics, and ethics that might have supported different forms of scientific and philosophical inquiry.

Richard Gombrich suggests that Buddhist philosophical methods, if they had dominated Indian intellectual life, might have produced "more empirically oriented and logically systematic approaches to understanding natural and social phenomena, potentially accelerating developments in mathematics, astronomy, and medicine while creating more egalitarian educational institutions."¹⁰ Such developments could have influenced not only intellectual culture but social organization, technological innovation, and cross-cultural exchange in ways that might have altered the entire trajectory of South Asian civilization.

Institutional Religious Pluralism

The coexistence of multiple sophisticated canonical traditions within the same cultural space created possibilities for systematic religious pluralism that recognized the legitimacy of diverse approaches to ultimate truth while maintaining institutional distinctiveness. Had this pluralistic model achieved greater stability and broader acceptance, it might have prevented the religious conflicts and exclusivist tendencies that characterized later periods of South Asian history.

John Cort's research on Jain-Hindu relations suggests that "sustained interaction between communities with different canonical traditions but shared cultural foundations could have produced forms of religious tolerance and intellectual exchange that might have served as models for managing religious diversity in other civilizations."¹¹ This alternative development might have created institutional frameworks for religious dialogue, shared educational resources, and cooperative approaches to social challenges that could have influenced political organization and cultural development throughout the region.

Literary and Artistic Innovation

The creative reinterpretation strategies developed by Jain and Buddhist authors demonstrated sophisticated approaches to cultural adaptation that could have supported more diverse and innovative forms of literary and artistic expression. Rather than maintaining rigid boundaries between sacred and secular literature, or between different religious traditions, broader acceptance of creative reinterpretation might have encouraged experimental approaches to narrative, poetry, and artistic representation.

The Jain practice of retelling familiar stories with transformed moral implications, and the Buddhist integration of diverse cultural materials into new synthetic frameworks, revealed techniques for cultural creativity that could have supported more dynamic and inclusive forms of artistic expression if they had achieved broader acceptance and institutional support.

Contemporary Implications of Alternative Traditions

The sophisticated textual strategies developed by Jain and Buddhist communities continue to offer valuable resources for contemporary religious communities seeking to navigate questions about tradition, innovation, and intercultural dialogue. Understanding how these alternative approaches functioned historically provides perspective on current debates about religious authority, textual interpretation, and spiritual authenticity that extend far beyond South Asian contexts.

Contemporary Hindu communities increasingly encounter Jain and Buddhist perspectives on familiar narratives and philosophical questions through academic study, interfaith dialogue, and global cultural exchange. Rather than viewing these alternatives as threats to Hindu tradition, many modern practitioners have discovered that engagement with Jain and Buddhist interpretations can deepen appreciation for the complexity and richness of shared cultural heritage while illuminating distinctive features of each tradition's spiritual approach.

Modern Jain communities, particularly in diaspora settings, continue to employ strategies of creative adaptation that echo their historical approaches to narrative reinterpretation. Contemporary Jain educational materials, children's literature, and community celebrations frequently present familiar cultural stories within frameworks that emphasize Jain ethical principles and spiritual goals. This ongoing practice demonstrates the continuing vitality of interpretive approaches that honor cultural continuity while maintaining religious distinctiveness.

Buddhist communities worldwide have developed sophisticated methods for adapting traditional teachings to contemporary cultural contexts that reflect their historical experience with creative appropriation and systematic reinterpretation. Modern Buddhist educational institutions, meditation centers, and scholarly organizations regularly employ techniques for engaging diverse cultural materials while maintaining doctrinal integrity that echo strategies developed during the classical period of Buddhist-Hindu interaction.

Perhaps most significantly, the historical example of successful religious pluralism within shared cultural space provides valuable perspective for contemporary discussions about religious diversity, interfaith cooperation, and cultural integration. The ability of Jain, Buddhist, and Hindu communities to maintain distinctive religious identities while participating in common cultural conversations suggests possibilities for managing religious diversity that avoid both fundamentalist exclusivism and relativistic dissolution of distinctive traditions.

Understanding how alternative textual traditions functioned within the broader ecology of South Asian religious culture illuminates both the remarkable achievement represented by Hindu textual preservation and the creative possibilities that emerged through sustained interaction between communities with different canonical foundations but shared cultural concerns. This historical perspective enriches contemporary appreciation for the complexity and dynamism that have always characterized South Asian religious life while providing resources for addressing current challenges related to tradition, innovation, and intercultural understanding.

The alternative narratives developed by Jain and Buddhist authors remind us that sacred stories gain their power not through exclusive ownership by particular communities but through their capacity to speak meaningfully to diverse spiritual needs and cultural contexts. Their editorial strategies demonstrate that respectful engagement with other traditions' sacred materials can enhance rather than diminish one's own religious understanding, while creative reinterpretation can serve simultaneously as cultural bridge-building and doctrinal clarification.

Most importantly, these alternative traditions illustrate how religious communities can maintain strong institutional identities and distinctive theological commitments while participating constructively in broader cultural conversations about ultimate meaning, ethical responsibility, and spiritual fulfillment. This historical example provides valuable guidance for contemporary religious communities seeking to honor their own traditions while engaging creatively and respectfully with the spiritual wisdom of other communities.

Notes

This opening scene is reconstructed from historical evidence about Buddhist monastery life and manuscript culture during the Mauryan and post-Mauryan periods, drawing on archaeological evidence from sites like Nālandā and textual descriptions in early Buddhist literature. See Gregory Schopen, Buddhist Monks and Business Matters(Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press, 2004), 112-143.
On patterns of "editorial subversion" in Jain and Buddhist literature, see Phyllis Granoff, "The Clever Adulteress and the Hungry Monk: A Translation of Stories from the Nisitha Curni," in The Clever Adulteress and Other Stories(Oakville: Mosaic Press, 1990), 1-25.
Vimalasūri, Paumacariya, critical edition by Hermann Jacobi (London: Luzac, 1962). For analysis of Jain Rāmāyaṇa traditions, see John E. Cort, "Telling Alternatives: A Study of the Jain Rāmāyaṇa Traditions," in Many Rāmāyaṇas, ed. Paula Richman (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1991), 121-147.
Jinasena, Harivaṃśa Purāṇa, ed. Pannalal Jain (Varanasi: Bharatiya Jnanpith, 1962). For analysis, see Phyllis Granoff, "Jain Biographies of Narada: A Study of Anti-Brahmanical Polemic in Jain Literature," Indologica Taurinensia 17-18 (1991-92): 189-202.
Phyllis Granoff, "Religious Biography and Clan History among the Śvetāmbara Jains in North India," East and West 39 (1989): 195-215.
Dīgha Nikāya 13 (Tevijja Sutta), translated in Maurice Walshe, The Long Discourses of the Buddha (Boston: Wisdom Publications, 1995), 187-196.
On tathāgatagarbha doctrine and its relationship to Hindu concepts, see Michael Zimmermann, A Buddha Within: The Tathāgatagarbhasūtra (Tokyo: International Research Institute for Advanced Buddhology, 2002), 45-78.
For comparative analysis of canonical development across traditions, see Jonathan Silk, "What, If Anything, Is Mahāyāna Buddhism? Problems in Definitions and Classifications," Numen 49, no. 4 (2002): 355-405.
Paul Dundas, The Jains, 2nd ed. (London: Routledge, 2002), 89-115.
Richard F. Gombrich, What the Buddha Thought (London: Equinox, 2009), 156-178.
John E. Cort, "Models of and for the Study of the Jains," Method and Theory in the Study of Religion 12, no. 1-2 (2000): 42-71.