जै · The Jain Encyclopedia
Gods of the lower world

Bhavanavāsī and Vyantara

भवनवासी · व्यन्तर

Two classes of god who live inside the upper layers of the first hell-earth, not in the heavens at all.

The Bhavanavāsī, the mansion-dwellers, occupy 7,72,00,000 palaces in the jewelled and muddy layers of Ratnaprabhā. They come in ten kinds, all called kumāra, youths: Asura, Nāga, Vidyut, Suparṇa, Agni, Vāta, Stanita, Udadhi, Dvīpa and Dik.

The Vyantara, the intermediate ones, live scattered anywhere in the lower and middle worlds rather than in a fixed tier. Śvetāmbara texts count sixteen kinds: the eight Vyantara proper (Piśāca, Bhūta, Yakṣa, Rākṣasa, Kinnara, Kiṃpuruṣa, Mahoraga and Gandharva) and eight Vāṇavyantara alongside them (Aṇapaṇṇī, Paṇapaṇṇī, Isivāī, Bhūyavāī, Kaṇḍiya, Mahākaṇḍiya, Kohaṇḍa and Payaga). These are the beings of ordinary Indian folklore, placed on the cosmological map.

Those sixteen kinds are why the Śvetāmbara census of Indras comes to sixty-four. Each class of Bhavanavāsī and each class of Vyantara has two Indras, giving 20 and 32; the Jyotiṣka contribute 2, and the twelve kalpas of Ūrdhva Loka contribute only 10, because the top four share in pairs. See The Śvetāmbara reckoning.

Both are gods, both are unliberated, and both rank below every tier of Ūrdhva Loka. Height in this cosmos tracks detachment, and these two classes are the least detached gods there are.

The third low class, the Jyotiṣka, are the suns, moons and stars circling above the flat earth.

02468101214rajjuSiddhaśilāno lifespanSarvārthasiddhi · centre33 sāgar.Vijaya · east31–33 sāgar.Vaijayanta · south31–33 sāgar.Jayanta · west31–33 sāgar.Aparājita · north31–33 sāgar.Upper Graiveyaka × 329–31 sāgar.Middle Graiveyaka × 326–28 sāgar.Lower Graiveyaka × 323–25 sāgar.12 Acyuta22 sāgar.11 Āraṇa21 sāgar.10 Prāṇata20 sāgar.9 Ānata19 sāgar.8 Sahasrāra18 sāgar.7 Mahāśukra17 sāgar.6 Lāntaka14 sāgar.5 Brahmaloka10 sāgar.4 Māhendra› 7 sāgar.3 Sanatkumāra7 sāgar.2 Īśāna› 2 sāgar.1 Saudharma2 sāgar.Madhya Lokahumans live hereBhavanavāsī and Vyantara› 1 sāgar.1 Ratnaprabhā1 sāgar.2 Śarkarāprabhā3 sāgar.3 Vālukāprabhā7 sāgar.4 Paṅkaprabhā10 sāgar.5 Dhūmaprabhā17 sāgar.6 Tamaḥprabhā22 sāgar.7 Mahātamaḥprabhā33 sāgar.longest lifeevery storey, top to bottom · click any rowyou are here
The universe, end to end — Bhavanavāsī and Vyantara highlighted

Measurements and counts

Bhavanavāsī kinds10
Bhavanavāsī palaces7,72,00,000
Vyantara kinds16 · 8 Vyantara, 8 Vāṇavyantara
Their Indras20 and 32
Whereupper layers of Ratnaprabhā
Longest lifea little over 1 sāgaropama
Liberated?no

Connected

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समयं गोयम! मा पमायए

Do not be heedless, Gautama, for even a single samaya.

Uttarādhyayana Sūtra 10