Doctrine of Jainas

Author(s): Walther Shubring, Wolfgang Beurlen
Publisher: Motilal Banarasidas

Page 60

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DOCTRINE OF THC JAINAS was shown by BÜHLERI. These inscriptions come from the district of Mathurā, and as far as they are dated they start with the 4th year of the Kaniska era=132-133 A.D.3; these oldest Svetāmbara evidences thus outdate that literary tradition by years and, moreover, improve them It now speaks for Bh 's importance that the more comprehensive list starts with him, for thus we are given evidence of the part he acted in spreading the religious belief (as will be mentioned below § 26). He also deserved well of preserving the doctrine. Acc. to Par. 9, 55 ff 5 a food crisis lasting in the country for twelve years forced the monks to emigrate to the coast” for some time, and it was due to these circumstances that the exact preservation and encouragement of the Jina teaching was interrupted. Here Bh. proves an expert of the sacred tests to a degree never reached again, for he is said to have been the last to know not only the 11 Anga but also the 12th, the Dıtthivāya, containing the icmains of 14 socalled Puvva or Pūrva ($ 37). When now a synod collecting the endangered texts met in Pātaliputia and sent for Bh. for the Ditthivāya, since he was on the way to Nepal, the attendants whom he was willing to instruct on the spot were able to comprehend but details of those 14 Püryas, with the only exception of Sthūlabhadra who brought with him 10 of them by memory. For Bh as the supposed author of comments see § 43. Owing to his long, though not definite absence from the centre of the community it was not Bh. who was its forinal head but his fellowpupil with Yaśobhadra named Sambhulavijaya who was followed by the above mentioned Sthūlabhadra as a leader, so that the latter was the pupil of either His relations to Bh., however,
I WZKM 1-4 2 Ther investigation is referred to by LUDERS, List (§ 4)
3 Comp KONOW Ep Ind 19, 1-15 Another calculation comes to 78 ARD
4 SBE XXII, p 291 under e iead Varana, D 292 above read Prilivarmika (Pkt Puvammiya), under gl Thani a Corr to Therāv p 80 aborc Rakkhiya, Rohagutta, Bambha and Soma ought to have been mentioned on P 292 as 1 m
5 It goes back to a kathānaha rendered by Āv 17, 11 after the catchwords in the Av Cunni and by Haribhadra and translated by LEUMANY Obers p. 25