Jain Shwetambar Conference Herald 1915 Book 11 Jain Itihas Sahitya Ank

Author(s): Mohanlal Dalichand Desai
Publisher: Jain Shwetambar Conference

Page 65

The Date of Siddharshi.
271
ween Haribhadra and Vardhamana soori which period as I have stated in the beginning of my letter is a dark age in the Jain era.
Sixthly.-There is one more matter to which I should draw your attention before concluding this letter. Fagra while describing Agsta ata ancî in his qiara Haggarmrr says that it was an tez 1 ra aequiar. (There is a pun upon the word वृत्तांत) Now it is a well known fact that this समरादित्यकथा was composed by Haribhadra. It takes a lorg time to be fixed as an 39ar like this. The compared object must have been so indelibly fixed in the minds of the readers that it ought to follow as a natural sequence following from well-known features. This is absolutely necessary in the case of 3qar, otherwise the whole structure comes down. Hence the significance of the above quotation. I do not press this last argument too much, but it has its own value. Whatever may be the respect due to Haribhadra in the mind of ingio he is bound to give 3qat of well-known things only.
As to your argument regarding the kind of Prakrit used by Haribhadra looking through the pages of 1993g & sprazania one is convinced that the Prakrit there used by Haribhadra was very high. The same used in AATETTA is no doubt decaying, but it does not show that tne same fact places the author at a later period for various reasons. (a) The book was eminently composed fer are and Arafts. Now under the circumstances he was bound to compose it in as an easy styleas possible, so that the persons for whom it was meant may grasp it. (b) The work is a composition on aitaigast and its style and terminology inust be necessarily simpler than a work on philosophy. I should also state that in the case of Prakrit simplicity, easiness and the use of decaying terminology are all convertible terms. (c) The Prakrit used by authors whose dates are certainly fixed earlier than that of Haribhadra have used decaying Prakrit in their composition. This is eminently so in the case of sales and all the works of artrīATAO, This disposes of your argument about the use of Prakrit.
As to the use of philosophical terminology I am told the