Haribhadra on the Affirmation of kāma “Sexual Appetite”

Abstract

In his Dhammasaṅgahaṇi 956ff., the Śvetāmbar Jain monk Haribhadra Yākinīputra (9th century) speaks of an opponent who asserts the legitimacy of sex by a mendicant who is driven by sexual appetite. This paper shows how the opponent legitimates his assertion and how Haribhadra criticizes his opponent’s claims. This paper also speculates on the object of the opponent’s view. The opponent’s assertion clearly reflects the affirmation of kāma as one of the puruṣārthas in the Brahmanical view on life. Thus at first glance the opponent seems to be a non-Jain who is based in a certain Brahmanical background. But it should be noted that one of the Śvetāmbar Jain texts on monastic rules, the Vyavahārabhāṣya (6th–7th century), gives permission to male mendicants who cannot control their sexual urges to have sex with women (up to three times). It is also possible that the opponent is none other than a Jain who is not very rigorous about the sexual rules governing Jain mendicants.