________________
128
JAINISM AND DEMOBRACY
3. The third Anga is Thanânga. Like Anguttara Nikāya of the Buddhist it deals with various themes of religion in numerical order from 1 to 10.
4. The fourth Ariga Samavaya also deals with the same subject matter in the same style. It does not stop at the number 10 but goes further as far as million. These two Anga gives a number of themes related to the later period. It is more appropriate to accept them as later interpolation rather than to fix a later date of the entire works.
Many parables describing the nature of human beings in their various station's are highly interesting.
5. The fifth Anga is Bhagvati-Viyaha-Pannati, known as Bhagvati in short. It is a big volume dealing with the entire field of Jainism. It is partly in the form of questions and answers, Mahāvira replying to the questions of his principal disciple Goyama Indrabhūti, and partly in the form of dialogue legends. This work gives a more vivid picture than any other work of the life and work of Mahāvira, his relationship to his disciple and contemporaries, and his whole personality.
The legendary portion of the work also gives an account of the predecessors of Mahāvīra, and of pious ascetics who attained great divine dignity through their severe castigation. The legends of the disciples of Pārsva, and of Jamali and Gosala are specially important to which the whole XV chapter is devoted.
The Bhagvti gives a true insight about the method of teaching and the society in the time of Lord Mahāvira.
Jain Education International
For Private & Personal Use Only
www.jainelibrary.org