________________ THE SOURCE OF PRAKRIT LANGUAGES The Indian grammarians of Prakrit Languages regard Sanskrit as their prakrti--their basis or origin or source. I quote here a few passages from their works bearing on this subject : (i) प्रकृतिः संस्कृतं तत्र भवं प्राकृतमुच्यते / --प्राकृतसर्वस्व (ii) प्रकृतिः संस्कृतं तत्र भवं तत आगतं वा प्राकृतम् --सिद्धहैम व्याकरण (iii) प्रकृतिः संस्कृतं तत्रभवत्वात् प्राकृतं स्मृतम् / —प्राकृतचन्द्रिका (iv) प्रकृतेः संस्कृतायास्तु विकृतिः प्राकृता मता / —षड्भाषाचन्द्रिका (v) प्राकृतस्य तु सर्वमेव संस्कृतं योनिः / —प्राकृतसञ्जीवनी The explanation of the word Prakrti as Sanskrit, however, is not accepted by some scholars. They would like us to understand the word in the sense of the basis for a comparative study of these languages. They also point out that no Sanskrit lexicon records this "Sanskrit" meaning of the word : prakrti and that at least in the context of the Desya words this "Sanskrit" meaning does not fit in. They derive the word as follows : (1) प्रकृत्या स्वभावेन सिद्धं प्राकृतम् / -- "Self-existent." or (2) प्रकृतीनां साधारणजनानामिदं प्राकृतम् / "What belongs to the masses, the common people." This derivation finds strong support in the writings of some reputed scholars and poets : For ready reference I quote here these passages : प्राकृतसंस्कृतमागधपिशाचभाषाश्च शूरसेनी च / षष्ठोऽत्र भूरिभेदो देशविशेषादपभ्रंशः // ' - On this karika the comments of Namisadhu run as follows Jain Education International For Private & Personal Use Only www.jainelibrary.org
