History of Jaina Monachism

Author(s): S B Deo
Publisher: Deccan College Research Institute

Page 29

S. B. DEO
(iii) JACOBI puts forth the evidence of language and the metres which, according to him, are archaic. He remarks, "I am of the opinion that the first book of the Acarängasútra and that of the Sūtrakṛtänga may be reckoned amongst the most ancient parts of the Siddhanta, the style of both works appears to me to prove the correctness of this assumption",55
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For these reasons, we may take the Angas-even though 'parts of the Angas are decidedly quite young's, as the oldest portion of the canon, and until critical editions of each and every text of the Angas are available we may ascribe the same antiquity to the whole group rather than go on detecting different strata in every text, which, it should be made clear, would be a matter of years of critical research. We may, in the present state of our knowledge, at the most, take the Acäränga and the Sutrakṛtänga as the earlier texts of the Anga group, when thinking of the whole series of the Anga books.
The Mulasütras:
Next to the Angas, the group of three (Uttaradhyayana, Avasyaka and Daśavaikälika) out of the four Mülasütras-the fourth being the Pinda or the Oghaniryukti-, may be taken as having a comparatively lesser antiquity than the Angas.
We have already noted that one of these texts, the Daśavaikälika, is attributed to one Sejjambhava who is said to have succeeded as the fourth head of the Church, and who wrote the book for his novice-son Manaka, in the year 98 after Mahavira's death.
Another text of the group, the Uttaradhyayana, seems to be of as much antiquity and appears as "the oldest nucleus consisting of valuable poems-series of gnomic aphorisms, parables and similes, dialogues and ballads which belong to the ascetic poetry of ancient India, and also have their parallels in the Buddhist literature in part" 57
Irrespective of the fact that its chapters are "a compilation of various texts, which belong to various periods",58 the later antiquity of this work as compared with the Sütrakrtänga, is argued by JACOBI on the basis "of the fact that the Uttaradhyayana gives but passing references to various heretical faiths, while the former text gives details about them". In vindication of his opinion, the learned scholar remarks, "Apparently the dangers expect
55. SBE., Vol. XXII, Intr., p. xii; WINTERNITZ, op. cit., pp. 435-41. 56. Prof. L. ALSDORF in a private letter to me.
57. WINTERNITZ, op. cit., p. 466. 58. Ibid.