Just like everyone, I assumed that all the famous temples of Khajuraho are essentially Hindu temples and dedicated to the stories of Vishnu and Shiva. But I was totally surprised to know that the Khajuraho is also home to about 31 Jain temples. Turns out that during the Chandela rule, many towns in Bundelkhand, including Khajuraho, were home to large and flourishing Jain communities. The temples signify remarkable harmony between the Hindus and the Jains as Jain traders used to fund the Chandela kings for the building of temples and administrative work.
Of the 31 temples, from an architectural point of view, the Parshvanath, Adinath and the Shantinath temples are relatively more important and noteworthy. I was taken by my guide to visit the Parshvanath temple since it’s one of the largest and probably the most visited Jain temple in Khajuraho.
Parshvanath is the 23rd Tirthankara in Jainism, but this temple wasn’t actually created for him. Adinath, the 1st Tirthankara was originally enshrined here, but the name was changed in 1860 after the sculptor made an idol of Parshvanath by mistake. Jain Tirthankaras are identified with their animal leitmotif and Parshvanath is represented using snakes.
This temple contains an inscription dating from 954 AD by its builder Pahila, mentioning donation of gardens and requesting future generations to safeguard the temple. What a noble visionary, I thought!
The coolest thing I saw was a well-known early magic square found in this temple. Called the “Jaina square”, it is one of the oldest known 4x4 magic squares as well as one of the oldest known most-perfect magic squares. This magic square contains all the numbers from 1 to 16. The sum of the numbers in every horizontal row, every vertical column and the two diagonal rows is 34.
The outer walls of the temple have three bands of sculptures featuring surasundaris (graceful women), flying couples, dancers, musicians, and celestial beings. Despite the temple’s Jain affiliation, the outer walls also depict Vaishnavite themes including sculptures of various Hindu gods and their incarnations with their consorts.
This was one of the last temples I visited in Khajuraho and I definitely wanted to write about it since it’s important for people to know that Khajuraho is really not only known for its erotic murals alone. So many stories, Communities and Gods make up Khajuraho. And they all co-existed in the same space with utmost harmony. Then why can’t we, I asked myself!
About the artist
Sajid Shaikh is a self-taught visual artist, illustrator & graphic designer and has worked for firms like Umbrella Design and Contract Advertising. His brand of contemporary graphics inspired by traditional / modern India is surreal, obscure, bold and adds a modern twist to the subject and touch of philosophy to the design.
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