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Who is The Author of the...
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The gist of the above discussion is that, just as Haribhadra süri is the author of the commentary of the very rich, in the same way he himself is the author of the Sūtra-text of the Pañcasūtraka. Concomitantly with the establishment of this truth, the tradional belief upheld by four scholars, namely Shah, Abhyankar, Upadhye, and Kulkarni and the arguments they offered for the corroboration of this belief, per se become invalid.
A question that now arises is precisely this. Though Haribhadra sūri is the author of the Pañcasūtra, yet whence and when arose this confusion / uncertainty about the authorship of this composition ?
From the investigations carried out, it seems that the confusion may have arisen in the 15th century of Vikrama Era or somewhere closer to that date. In the three available ancient palm-leaf manuscripts of the Pancasūtra, which in all probability were written between the 12th and the 14th century of Vikrama Era, as recorded by Munirāja Jambūvijaya, there is no reference anywhere to its author. The only indication there is 'HHT TE66'. It can be inferred that, during that period, there might not be any confusion regarding the authorship of this work. The first record of the type may be sensed in the following statement :
‘पाञ्चसूत्रं प्राकृतमूलम्, सूत्राणि २१०. gfu afya CC067
The list of the Jaina works in the afgufat which was prepared by some learned Jain-monk early in the latter half of the 16th century of Vikrama Era, does not refer to this record regarding the author of the Pañcasūtra and therein it has been reported that the commentary thereon is 'Hāribhadrī.' It cannot be denied that the confusion might have arisen from this record. If we focus on this record and read evig cuci Elfu po afro afecco', and if we draw therefrom the meaning—The Pañcasūtra in the Prakrit language having 210 sūtras, and the vrtti thereon equal in volume to verses 880—with the addition of the particle 27, it cannot be denied that the term Haribhadri is supposed to have covered both the Sūtra (original text) and the Vrtti (the commentary). And the term Haribhadri is in the feminine gender consistently with the feminine gender of the word Vrtti.
Of course, this may be looked upon as a little far-fetched; for all earlier scholars, in view of the fact that author's name was not specified for
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