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Shri Mahavir Jain Aradhana Kendra
www.kobatirth.org
Acharya Shri Kailassagarsuri Gyanmandir
ix
the displeasure of the deities presiding over the constellations, he borrows the Vedic !ist of 28 Nakshatras, the Vedic Vichriti (Jyeshta) among them. Not a word is said of the Planets. Had the planets been known to him and had he been acquainted with the Zodiac and the planetary influence on man's weal and woe, he would have scarcely withstood the temptation of preferring planetary astrology to stellar astrology. It is very well known to liistorians of India that long before the Hindus borrowed through the Indo-Greek and Indo-Parthians on the North-Western frontier of India the Roman zodiacal terms together with astrological ideas, it was stellar astrology that prevailed in India. In the medico-astrological works that were written after the Indo-Greek contact with India no place is given to stellar astrology (lunar asterism) as described in this Sutra. Nor is this all. The author attempts to imitate the style of the Taittiriyopanishad and in the 5th Prasna (sutras 44-49 and 85-88) uses the very words of the Upanishad.
Apart from the internal evidences there is also some external evidence which gives some antiquity to this Sutra. It is the reference made by Vagbhata in the last chapter of his Ashtangalıridaya to a medical work which le attributes to Brahma or Brahina's son Sanatkumara. He says that Brahma prescribed oil, clarified butter, and honey to cure Vata, Pitta, and Sleshmia respectively. Though the very words are not found in this text, words giving the same purport are found here and there. In I. 70 sweets and acids are said to be the cause of Kapla. In his commentary on IV. 57 the writer says that clarified butter, inilk, and oil are the prescribed remedies against wind. In V. 9, 10 and 11 similar general remedies against Kapha, and wind are prescribed.
While these facts tend to give the work an
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