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that Parshvanath the Tirthankara, who preceeded him, and after whom is named the Parasnath hill, the most sacred place of pilgrimage to the Jains, was also a historical personage". The beliefs of the Jains and the research of scholars cannot be called "matters of detail and obscure facts" which may safely be avoided.
4. If the authors did not know their facts well and did not try to study Jainism the paragraph "He, Mahavira joined an order of the monks founded by Parshvanath and remained a member of the order for several years, but could not obtain peace of mind. So, when he was about forty years of age, he cut off his connection with the order and founded a religious system of his own called Jainism", may well have been omitted as a matter of detail, un-necessarily crowding the mind of young students.
5. The metaphysical discussion as to what is meant by god and as to whether the Jains believe in God or not may also have best been left out in an elementary historical reader. If the authors had cared to study Jainism they could not have failed to benefit from the well-known work of Mr. Herbert Warren, named"Jainism not Atheism".
6. The statement that the Jains believe that even
lifeless objects possess soul is quite indefensible on the
face of it. It is absurd and a contradiction in terms. The
