Mahavira His Life and Teachings

Author(s): Bimla Charn Law
Publisher: Luzac and Co UK

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MAHĀVĪRA . HIS LIFE AND TEACHINGS
import of the word nartthāna when he inclines to equate it with māyāsthāna 1 The twelve Angas were the matrices or fundamental bases of the Jaina Siddhānta
Even with regard to the Angas, it may be shown that Ardha-Māgadhi, the literary idiom developed in them, is younger than Pāli of the Buddhist Canon preserved in Ceylon In the same connection, one may think with Professor Jacobi that
the first book of the Acārānga and that of the Sūtrakrtānga-Sūtra may be reckoned among the most ancient parts of the Siddhānta ', or that the Vaitāliya metre used in the Pali Dhammapada represents ' an older stage in the development of the Vaitālıya' than that in the Sūtrakrtānga 8 Even one may cite instances of parallelism between Jainism and Buddhism, and of influence of the latter on the former When we see that Mahāvīra is honoured with such epithets as Buddha, Tathāgata, Sugata, and Sambuddha, we cannot help feeling that these are borrowed Just take them away, and you see that Jina, Arhat, Tīrthankara, Vīra, Mahāvīra, Vaiśālika, Nirgrantha, the
1 Jaina-Sūtras, Pt II, p 304, f n 3 2 Ayāramga, edited by Jacobi, Introd 3 Jaina-Sūtras, Pt I, Introd , p xli