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Jaina Ethics and Miscellaneous Customs and Manners
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Further, being mainly a commercial community, the Jainas are linguists in the sense that they can successfully use more than one language.
Apart from the contributions of the Jainas to the literature in various regional languages, the Jainas possess a vast amount of their sacred literature written by their veteran Acharyas or teachers in the Sanskrit, Prakrit 267 and Apabhramsa 268 languages. There is a division in the sacred literature also. The Digambaras and the Svetambaras have their separate sacred books and there are very few books like Umāsvāti's Tattvārthādhigama-sūtra which are revered by both the sects. 269 In face of severe opposition from other religionists the Jainas have preserved with great care a considerable portion of their literature. Many of these works are still lying in the manuscipt form and comparatively a few of them have been published in the modern book form. Along with religion and ethics, the Jaina works deal with various kinds of subjects like grammar, prosody, glossary, mathematics, medicine, astrology, etc. The Jaina authors have used several forms of literature like prose, poetry, story, sūtra, etc. Further, it is maintained that the Jaina literature contains a huge amount of historical material dispersed in various kinds of works and that their thorough and scientific investigation will throw a new light on ancient Indian history. 270
18. JAINA INSTITUTIONS Though the Jaina community is a small community of twentysix lacs population which is spread throughout India and has been split up into various sects, sub-sects, castes, sub-castes, language groups, etc., still we find that the Jainas are conducting from the last so many years a good number of institutions for the benefit of both their community members and other people in general. Their institutions can be broadly divided into two categories, namely, charitable and other institutions meant for the Jainas and non-Jainas alike and institutions run exclusively for the upliftment and welfare of the Jainas. It is obvious that the Jainas are in a position to maintain a large number of institutions of both the types because they can afford to do so. By conducting the institutions of the first type they have secured good-will from others and through the institutions of the second type they have tried to
