Buddhism is the "middle way", Jainism is the "most strict religion" with two Traditions or Denominations:

• The "Diganbara" (naked) are monks and nuns with vow of "nudity", usually living in monasteries.
• The "Svatembara" (white-robed).

They have 6 rules:

• Destroy no life.
• Do not lie.
• Practice charity.
• Practice chastity.
• Posses nothing, want nothing.
• Devotion of whole life to task (Moshka).

"Jina", "the conqueror", the enlightened one:
To obtain "Nirvana", Mahavira left his rich home and wandered for 13 years with a Spartan life of denial of all worldly things, even walking nude... until enlightenment suddenly came to him after meditating for 2½ days under saia tree on a river bank in Nepal... here enlightenment is called "Jina" (the conqueror, victorious), and from "Jina" comes the name "Jainism".

It is a most paradoxical religion:
They rejected the gods of Hinduism, but now practically every existing thing is a god: The mountains and earth and stones have a "soul", every plant, every animal is a god... this leads to respect for the sanctity of life: They carry a small broom to sweep all forms of life from their path, and even they ware masks over their mouths so as to not accidentally swallow flies or other insects... because they are gods... and Jainism has beautiful Temples.

There is no god to help you to obtain "Jain", but Mahavira is god, and they have beautiful temples like the one in Calcutta I have seen... and Mt. Aby in central India is a most holy place...

They are only 5 million Jains in India, but very influential, because they are most successful bankers and merchants, in spite the Jainism most rigid restrictions on accumulating wealth... The first rule is to avoid any bad karma, to control all passions, emotions, pride, anger, lying, greed... and to build good karma, one must practice charity, give freely of one's wealth to aid the poor, build hospitals, homes for the orphans, schools, and build temples for the Hindu gods... though all Hindu gods are no gods, all of them are inferior deities subordinated to Mahavira.

Mahavira
Mahavira is regarded as the man who gave Jainism its present-day form; although this is true only in the widest sense. He is sometimes wrongly called "the founder of Jainism". Mahavira is only this world's most recent tirthankara (and will be the last one in this age). It may be more useful to think of him as a reformer and populariser of an ancient way of life rather than as the founder of a faith.

Early life of Mahavira
Mahavira was originally born as Vardhamana in north east India in 599 BCE (that's the traditional date but some modern scholars prefer 540 BCE, or even later). He was a prince, the son of King Siddhartha and Queen Trishala, who were members of the kshatriya (warrior) caste and followers of the teachings of Parshva.

He was a prince, the son of King Siddhartha and Queen Trishala, who were members of the kshatriya (warrior) caste and followers of the teachings of Parshva.

Mahavira becomes an ascetic
When Prince Vardhamana reached thirty years of age, not long after the death of both his parents, he left the royal palace to live the life of an ascetic, or a sadhana (one who renounces all worldly pleasures and comforts). He spent twelve and a half years subjecting himself to extremely long, arduous periods of fasting and meditation.

Eventually his efforts bore fruit, and Vardhamana attained Kevalnyan, enlightenment, and therefore was later called Mahavira, (the name means great hero: maha =great, vira = hero).

Mahavira the teacher
From that day forward Mahavira taught the path he had discovered to other seekers. His teaching career lasted until his physical death in 527 BCE (according to Svetambara texts), when he was 72 years old.

After a final period of intensive fasting he attained moksha, the final liberation from all rebirth. Mahavira added the principle of chastity to the four Jain principles already given by Parshva (no violence, no lying, no stealing, no possessions).

According to tradition Mahavira is said to have established a community of 14,000 monks and 36,000 nuns before he died. But he certainly did create a large and loyal monastic/ascetic/mendicant community inspired by his teaching. One of his immediate disciples, Jambu, was the last person in this age to achieve enlightenment. Over the next centuries the Jain community grew and spread to central and western parts of India.

Jainism began to lose strength as Hinduism grew in the early part of the last millennium, and by the middle of the 19th century it was seriously weakened. Jainism was revived in the 19th century by a number of Svetambara reformers, most notably Atmaramji (1837-96). In the 20th century the Digambara movement was revitalised through the work of Acarya Shantisagar.