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BOOK REVIEW
The 5 works below are published as Vols. 1-5 of the Research Publications Series of the Research Institute of Prakrit, Jainology and Ahimsa, Muzaffarpur (Bihar), under the General Editorship of Dr. Nathmal Tatia who is the Director of the Institute.
A feature common to Vols. 1, 4 and 5 is that the authors thereof worked for varying periods as Research Scholars at the Institute.
Another feature common to Vols. 1, 2 and 4 is that these were submitted to and accepted by Bihar University as Theses for the Ph.D degree.
1. STUDIES IN THE BHAGAVATI SUTRA by Dr. Jogendra Chandra Sikdar: 1964: Pages xxiv+658 Price Rs. 18.67.
The original text with which this publication deals is the 5th Anga of the Svetambara canonical works, named Viyahapaññatti (Sansk. Vyakhyā-prajñapti), called popularly the Bhagavati-Sutra. It is always to be borne in mind by critical enquirers that the canon in its present form has come down to us as fixed by the Valabhi Council presided over by Devardhi in 5th-6th centuries A.D., and that some more additions to and alterations in it did not fail to take place in still later times too. The Council worked of course, on the basis of older written material and oral traditions.
The Bhagavati is the most voluminous text among the entire sacred literature. Orthodoxy claims it as the root and source of all the other texts and that all doctrines had their origin in it, which is to be rejected,
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