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अनुसन्धान-५४ श्रीहेमचन्द्राचार्यविशेषांक भाग-२
as well as the editor and main contributor of Asiatic Researches. His broad interests also extended to the Jains, as is evidenced primarily from his “Observations on the Sect of Jains” (1807).2 Whereas Major Mackenzie and Colonel Buchanan, he writes, got information on the Jains from “Jain priests” and oral information, “I am enabled to corroborate both statements, from conversation with Jaina priests, and frombooks in my possession, written by authors of the Jaina persuasion” (p. 287).
The main part of Colebrooke's essay is then devoted to the contents of these books:
“I shall ... state the substance of a few passages from a work of great authority among the Jainas, entitled Kalpasûtra, and from a vocabulary of the Sanskrit language by an author of the Jaina sect” (p. 302). ‘Combined information provided by both works about the 24 Jinas of the avasarpiņi and other Jaina mythological categories is then analyzed:
“[Jinas] appear to be the deified saints, who are now worshipped by the Jaina sect.
They are all figured in the same contemplative posture, with little variation in their appearance, besides a difference of complexion; but the several Jinas have distinguishing marks or characteristic signs, which are usually engraved on the pedestals of their images, to discriminate them” (p. 304).
Ages and periods of time as described in the Abhidhānacintāmaņi are also dealt-with (p. 313). Finally comes an exposition of Jaina cosmology: “The Samgrahaņiratna and Lokanāb-sūtra [i.e. Lokanāli), both in Prakrit, are the authorities
2. 'Observations on the sect of Jains' in Asiatic Researches Vol. 9, pp. 287-322, Calcutta, 1807 (London ed. 1809), available on Google Books: reprinted in Miscellaneous Essays by H. T. Colerooke (with the Life of the Author. By his son, Sir T.E.Colebrooke, in 3 volumes), Vol. 2, pp. 171
