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REVIEWS OF BOOKS AND PERIODICALS 61
Digambaras and Swetambaras, including the Sthanakvasis-are fast dwindling in numbers. Their knowledge of Jainism is almost nil. Their pursuit of Jainism is formal, ritualistic merely. They are law-abiding. because they cannot be violent. Their crimes are crimes of non-violence, of deception more than of manly aggressiveness. The believers in Jainism say: it proves the great Peaceinducing powers of Jainism that Himsa (Violence) is so successfully uprooted from the Jaina mind. The critics of Jainism assert : Himsa is only driven deeper into the Jaina mind and their violence is characterised by more cunning and effeminacy than that of nonJainas. With such decreasing numbers and doubtful following of the creed of Jainism, no wonder that the Jainas have been wofully apathetic to their Laws. They are indignant at being called "Hindu dissenters;" but they are mortally afraid of not being called “ Hindus " whom they revile aud despise everyday in their temples and homes by dubbing them Anya Mati believers of other faiths, i.e. “Truth dissenters" where Truth means Jainism.
The late lamented Pandit Gopal Das Baraiya of Morena, Gwalior, was an English-knowing Pandit, who hated English Education and opposed English-educated men in season and out of season. He discovered the Bhadrabahu Samhita at Jhalrapatan, where there is the beautiful and ancient temple of Lord Shanti Natha, looked after by that pious family of Jaina merchant princes, the renowned owners of the firm of Seth Binodiram Balchand, with their dozens of branches all over India. The only known and extant manuscript of Bhadrabahu Samhita is there. It is a very big book. From this, Pandit Gopal Dasji took the portion on Jaina Inheritance and Partition and translated it into Hindi. This translation he published in the last quarter of the last century in the Hindi Weekly, the Jaina Mitra of Bombay, of which he was the Editor,
When I started the English Jaina Gazette in its present form at Allahabad in 1904, I translated and published in English the Slokas from the Jain Mitra. When later (1906-1909) I went to Oxford and London for my legal studies, I took up the work again
and put it in book form. The translation was given to be read by Shree Sudharmaswami Gyanbhandar-Umara, Surat
www.umaragyanbhandar.com
| SR No. | 034889 |
| Book Title | Jaina Gazette 1927 |
| Original Sutra Author | N/A |
| Author | J L Jaini, Ajitprasad |
| Publisher | Jaina Gazettee Office |
| Publication Year | 1927 |
| Total Pages | 568 |
| Language | English |
| Classification | Book_English |
| File Size | 47 MB |