Early Jainism

SR No.: 001520
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: K K Dixit
Publisher: L D Indology Ahmedabad
Publication Year: 1978
Total Pages: 120
Language: English
Classification: Book_English, Agam, Canon, & Philosophy
File Size: 7 MB

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Early Jainism
tion deliberate omission was made of passages that were equally available and were deemed equally authoritative. That however is a minor difficulty. A major difficulty with Schubring's thesis is that it does not seem to be impossible that one and the same author should compose a nirgranthasūtra and also a bhikṣu-sütra. What seems to have happened is that in a passage where the word monk' was understood to mean an ideal monk the employment of the honorific epithet 'nitgrantha' was considered proper but that in a passage where it was understood to mean a monk falling short of the ideal the employment of the neutral epithet bhikṣu was considered proper; eg, in the injunction 'a monk should not accept a raw palm--fruit as alms' (Kalpa 1.1) the word 'monk' means an ideal monk and so is translatable as 'nirgrantha', but in the injunction 'a monk who has quare. lled with his fellow-monks should bury the hatchet' (Kalpa 1. 35) it means a monk falling short of the ideal and so should better be translated as bhikṣu.
Perhaps, the process of the growth of the Chedasūtras has to be envis. aged gomewhat as follows. In the early post-Mahāvira period there grew up in the different parts of Eastern India different Jaina monastic cen. tres. Now the monks belonging to these different centres must have come to encounter all sorts of disciplinary problems - such as related to their dealing with society at large as also such as related to their dealing with one another. In connection with all these problems rulings must have been given by those occupying the position of leadership in the monastic centres in question. And it was the most important of these rulings that were later on compiled in the form of Kalpa and Vyavahāra--the former mainly governing those related to a monk's dealing with society at large, the latter those related to his dealing with his fellow-monks. Somewhat still later another such compilation was made which also contained rulings related to the questions of a relatively secondary Importance; another speciality of this compilation was that in it the rulings whose violation entailed the same punisment were located at one place. It is this compila. tion that is our present-day Nisītha. Thus emerged, Niśītha must have proved to be an extremely handy guide to the Jaina church functionaries - first because it covered a huge number of likely contingencies, secondly because in the case of each and every ruling it prescribed due punishment for the violators. Hence it was that in certain rulings which were later interpolated in Vyavabāra--they are later interpolations because they contain a reference to Vyayahāra itself-it was held out that a church functionary must be conversant with Niśítha at least (3.3) while in case he had also mastered Kalpa and Vyavahāra he would be entitled to a suitably high post (3,5). The intriguing thing about these rulings is that they mention Niśitha by the title Ācāraprakalpa and