Tattvartha Sutra

SR No.: 006796
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: Sukhlal Sanghavi, K K Dixit
Publisher: L D Indology Ahmedabad
Publication Year: 2000
Total Pages: 596
Language: English
Classification: Book_English, Tattvartha Sutra, & Tattvarth
File Size: 10 MB

Page 446

CHAPTER SEVEN
273
etc. accepted by a householder. Such minor-scale vratas are five which, inasmuch as they serve as root or foundation-stone for world-renunciation, are called mūlaguna—that is fundamental virtue—or mūlavrata-that is, fundamental vrata. And with a view to protecting, nourishing and purifying these fundamental vratas a householder also accepts certain other vratas known as uttraguna—that is, subsidiary virtue-or uttaravrata—that is, subsidiary vrata.
Such subsidiary vratas are here briefly enumerated to be seven. And there is also reference here to a vrata that a householder vratin is impelled to adopt right at the end of his life; that vrata is designated samlekhanā. The following is a summary delineation of the nature of all these vratas.
1. Generally speaking, the entire tradition of Lord Mahāvīra is without a difference of opinion as to the number five of the minor-scale vows, or as to their name or their order of enumeration. Only in the Digambara tradition certain authorities have enumerated 'refrainment from nightly eating' as a sixth minor-scale vow. But as regards the householder's vratas treated as secondary virtues there are current a number of traditions, old and new. In the Svetāmbara sect two such traditions are observable, one that pertaining to the Tattvārthasūtra, the other that pertaining to the texts like Āgamas etc. The first enumerates not upabhogaparibhogaparimānavrata but deśaviramanavrata after digviramanavrata, while the second enumerates upabhogaparibhogaparimānavrata after digviramanavrata and deśaviramanavrata after sāmāyikavrata. But in spite of this difference as to the order of enumeration there is here no difference at all as to designating a particular set of three of these vratas as gunavrata and the set of the remaining four as siksāvrata. On the other hand, in the Digambara sect as many as six traditions are current as to subsidiary virtues; thus different views are held on the question by the authorities like Kundakunda, Umāsvāti, Samantabhadra, Svāmi-Kārtikeya, Jinasena, Vasunandin. In connection with this difference of views the divergence pertains sometimes to name, sometimes to the order of enumeration, sometimes to number, sometimes to the development-of-meaning. Those desirous to familiarize themselves with the details of the matter must go through Babu Jugalkishoraji Mukhtar's Hindi book 'Jainācāryom ka Sāsanabheda' from p. 29 onwards. Publisher Jainagrantharatnakar Karyalaya, Hirabag, Bombay.