The Bhikṣuṇī Maṇimēkhalai

258 - The Various Systems of Beliefs
of their sufferings; and He, besides whom there is none else, such a
one is my God’.
The Brahmavādī told her that the whole of the universe is the
outcome of one egg brought forth by the supreme being, Brahma. A
teacher who had eagerly studied the purāṇa of Viṣṇu (he of the colour
of the sea) asserted that Nārāyaṇa was the protector of all.
The Vēdavādī averred that the Veda, otherwise called Āraṇa, the
unborn source of knowledge, has neither beginning nor end. Kalpa
constitutes its hands, Candas its feet, Eṇ (Jyotiṣa or astronomy) its
eyes, Nirukta its ears, Śikṣa its nose and Vyākaraṇa its face. ‘The path
taught in the Veda is the path of life.’
Maṇimēkhalai felt that the teachings of these would not conform
either to truth itself as taught in learned books, or as practised by the
knowing. [193]
Ājīvaka
She then addressed the venerable one, the expounder of ‘the book’ of
the Ājīvakas, and asked him to state what the governing deity was
according to him and what the authoritative work of his teaching.
The Ājīvaka teacher replied:
‘That one whose knowledge is limitless and who is seen immanent
always and in all things of the vast and limitless variety of things that
exist, is ‘our supreme teacher.’