Jaina Sutras 02 Uttaradhyayan Sutra and Sutrakritang Sutra

Author(s): Hermann Jacobi
Publisher: Max Muller

Page 25

INTRODUCTION.
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of Buddha and Mahâvîra, divided mankind into six classes !. Of these, according to Buddhaghôsa ?, the third class contains the Niganthas. Gôsâla probably would not have ranked them as a separate, i. e. fundamental subdivision of mankind, if they had only recently come into existence. He must have looked upon them as a very important, and at the same time, an old sect, in the same way in which, in my opinion, the early Buddhists looked upon them. As a last argument in favour of my theory I may mention that in the Magghima Nikâya 35, a disputation between the Buddha and Sakkaka, the son of a Nigantha, is narrated. Sakkaka is not a Nigantha himself, as he boasts of having vanquished Nâtaputta in disputation", and, moreover, the tenets he defends are not those of the Gainas. Now when a famous controversialist, whose father was a Nigantha, was a contemporary of the Buddha, the Niganthas can scarcely have been a sect founded during Buddha's life.
Let us now confront the records of the Gainas about the philosophical doctrines of heretics, which they had to combat, with such as the Buddhists describe. In the Sûtrakritânga II, I, 15 (p. 339 f.) and 21 f. (p. 343) two materialistic theories which have much in common are spoken of. The first passage treats of the opinion of those who contend that the body and the soul are one and the same thing; the second passage is concerned with the doctrine that the five elements are eternal and constitute everything. The adherents of either philosophy maintain that it is no sin to kill living beings. Similar opinions are, in the Sâmaññaphala Sutta, ascribed to Pûrana Kassapa and Agita Kesakambalî. The former denies that there is such a thing as sin or merit. Agita Kesakambalî holds that nothing real
1 Sâmaññaphala Sutta, Digha Nikâya II, 20.
Sumangala Vilásinf, p. 162. Buddhaghôsa expressly states that Gôsâla reckoned the Niganthas lower than his own lay disciples, who form the fourth class.-As Buddhaghosa does not take umbrage at Gôsâla's reckoning the Bhikkhus still lower, it is clear that he did not identify the Bhikkhus with the Buddhist monks.
* See p. 250 of the Pali Text Society edition.