Canonical Literature Of Jainas

Author(s): H R Kapadia
Publisher: Hindi Granth Karyalay

Page 82

III]
REDACTION OF THE JAINA CANON
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and the learned opinions of Indologists can very well serve the necessary purpose. Moreover, I do not intend to enter into a controversy in this connection; but at the same time I am prepared to hear convincing arguments that may be advanced to support the allegations, and if satisfied, I shall identify myself with persons making these allegations. But, at least for the present I hold a contrary view, though I admit that some passages here and there appear to wear a colour of a patch-work. Under these circumstances, I shall therefore sum up this discussion by quoting the following lines from the late Prof. Jacobi's introduction to The Sacred Books of the East (vol. xxii, p. xxxix ):
"Devarddhi's position relative to the sacred literature of the Gainas appears therefore to us in a different light from what it is generally believed to have . been. He probably arranged the already existing MSS. in a canon, taking down from the mouth of learned theologians only such works of which MSS. were not available. Of this canon a great many copies were taken, in order to furnish every seminary with books which had become necessary by the newly introduced change in the method of religious instructions. Devarddhi's edition of Siddhanta is therefore only a redaction of the sacred books which existed before his time in nearly the same form. Any single passage in a sacred text may have been introduced by the editor, but the bulk of Siddhanta is certainly not of his making. The text of the sacred books, before the last redaction of the Siddhanta did not exist in such a vague formas it would have been liable to if it were preserved by the memory of the monks, but it was checked by MSS.”
1 Cf. A His. of Ind. Lit, (vol. II, pp. 434-435).