Universal Values of Prakrit Texts

SR No.: 006701
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: Prem Suman Jain
Publisher: Bahubali Prakrit Vidyapeeth and Rashtriya Sanskrit Sansthan
Publication Year: 2011
Total Pages: 368
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 19 MB

Page 57

Similarly there are several words in Prakrit which were coined as varga, varganā, spardhaka, guṇahāni, palya, sāgara, antarmuhūrta, etc. which carry measures in the theory of Karma. In cosmology also, the word yojanā, in Jainology carries three types of measures used in cosmology, astronomy and geography respectively. It has the working as the 'LI' in China.
Each of these newly coined words has its own significance. For example the varga or a variety is a set of avibhagi padicchedas (indivisiblecorresponding - sections) of some abstract measurable object, like the Yoga or Kaṣāya, which are responsible for the karmic bonds measured in terms of pradesas (particles of matter), Prakrti (configuration), sthiti (life/time) and the anubhāga (energy-level).
Thus all such words which denoted some mathematical measures were rendered into the three types of symbols we have already talked about. Symbols are needed in mathematics to lead the thought to deeper and deeped abstractions not possible without mathematical manouevre, as we find in the Boolean laws of thoughts and logic. When we require the words to become mathematical measures, their meaning becomes the measure (Pramāna) they carry, and one has to be very careful in coining such a word as well as its symbol. The coining of a symbol is most significant because the whole progress of the theory depends on its choice in a proper way. It may be the initial letter of the word, a part of the word, a numeral, an algebraic letter or geometrical figure to be used in an equation or an inequality referring to some event in the karmic theory.
We are grateful to the ascetics who created the sciences in India and advanced them their most scientific script known as the Brahmi script, specially in the above Prakrit works in which some remains of the script may still be available.
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