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THE CANONICAL LITERATURE OF THE JAINAS
(CHAP.
the passage is therefore, that a monk should not accept as alms any substance of which only a part can be eaten and a great part must be rejected.”
(iv) The date of the composition of Āyāra can be settled from the metres used in it. An attempt in this direction was made by the late Prof. H. Jacobi in S. B. E. (vol. XXII, intro. XLI-XLII). There he has said:
“ Again, ancient Pâli works seem to contain no verses in the Aryâ metre; at least there is none in the Dhammapadam, nor have I found one in other works. But both the Akârânga and Sûtrakritânga contain each a whole lecture in Arya verses of a form which is decidedly older than, and probably the parent of the common Arya... From all these facts we must conclude that the chronological position of the oldest parts of the Gaina literature is intermediate between the Pâli literature and the composition of the Lalita Vistara.”
In this connection the late K. H. Dhruva has observed in his Evolution of Gujarati verse' (p. 171) that the German scholar Jacobi believes that the composition of Suttanipāta is followed by that of Dhammapada, and those of Āyāra and Sūyagada are even later than those of these Bauddha works. Further, on p. 173, Dhruva says that there is a slip on the part of Jacobi in naming Gāthānustubhī samsrsti as the olden Aryā and in assigning to Ayāra and Sūyagada a date later than that of Dhammapada, on the ground that this metre is used in these two Jaina works. For, this metre is used even in Suttanipāta; in its Mettasutta and Tuvațțakasutta“, and consequently it should be looked upon as 1 This work is written in Gujarātī and is named as under:
પદ્યરચનાની ઐતિહાસિક આલોચના.” 2 This metre is used for Thiparinnā and Uváhānasuya. The latter is
edited as it is and also as it should be from the metrical view-point by K. H.
Dhruva in Evolution of Gujarati verse ( pp. 185-196 ). 3 In this connection, K. H. Dhruva has observed on p. 174 as under:
“લુપ્ત થયેલા શબ્દો જૂના પ્રયોગો અને ભિખુની સાદી અસલી રહેણીકરણીને આધાર કરી ચૂક્યું છે કે સુત્તનિપાત જૂનામાં જૂને પદ્યાત્મક સંગ્રહ છે. બૈદ્ધ સંઘની સ્થાપના તે એને પૂર્વ અવધિ મનાય છે. આયાર અને સૂયગડ અંગ એક જ જૈન મુનિની કૃતિ
છે, જ્યારે સુત્તનિપાત અનેક ભિન્નકાળના બૌદ્ધ ભિખ્ખનાં સુત્તાનો સંગ્રહ છે.” * “એનૂ મેસુર સમગ્ર અને તુવઠ્ઠસુરને માટે ભાગ પણ એ જ મિશ્ર છંદમાં છે.”
- Ibid., p. 172
