Nyayavatara

Author(s): Satyaranjan Banerjee
Publisher: Sanskrit Book Depot P Ltd

Page 29

(xxix)
Legends and historical accounts show that Siddha Sena was the well-known Kṣapaṇaka (the Jaina sage), who adorned the court of Vikramaditya and was one of the Nine Gems (Nava Ratna).1 Varahamihira, the famous astronomer, who also was another of the Nine Gems of the court of Vikramaditya, lived between A.D. 5052 and A.D. 587. We are told that Kṣapaṇaka alias Siddha Sena was a contemporary of Varamihira; so he must have flourished about the middle of the 6th Century.
2. Candraprabha Sūri, author of Nyayavatara-vivṛti (?)
There is an excellent commentary on the Nyāyāvatāra called the Nyayavatara-vivṛti possibly by Candraprabha Suri, who also belonged to the Svetambara sect and founded the Pūrṇima Gaccha1 in Samvat 1159 or A.D. 1102. He was a pupil of Jayasimha Sūri and preceptor of Dharmaghosa. He wrote another logical treatise called Prameya-ratna-koşa and a philosophical treatise called DarśanaSuddhi otherwise called Samyaktva-prakaraṇa. He was a great logician, and in controversy appeared as a lion before the opponents,
1 The Nine Games are:
धन्वन्तरिः क्षपणकोऽमरसिंहः शङ्क ुर्वेतालभट्टघटखर्प रकालिदासाः ।
saraì azıgfafgeì qqà: amai zaifa â azefaĤa fanne 11
(Jyotirvidabharana).
2 Vide Dr. Thibaut's Introduction to Pañcasiddhantikä, p. xxx. Varāhamihira chose Śaka 427 or A.D. 505 as the initial year of his astronomical calculation, showing thereby that he lived about that time. So
सप्ताश्विवेद - संख्यं शककालमपास्य चैत्रशुक्लादौ । अर्द्धस्तमिते भानौ यवनपुरे सौम्यदिवसाद्ये ॥ ८ ॥
(Pancasiddhantikā, Chap. I, edited by Dr. G. Thibaut and Sudhakara
Dvivedi.)
3 For Candraprabha Suri see Peterson's Fourth Report, p. xxvii, and Peterson 3, xvi. In the Nyāyāvatāra-vivṛti itself there is no mention of Candraprabha Sūri. I remember to have found somewhere that he was the author of it. The authorship of the Nyāyāvatāravivṛti must however for the present remain an open question. In the colophon of the Nyāyāvatāra-vivṛti it is stated that it was the work of Siddhasena-Divakara-vyäkhyānaka, or simply Siddha-vyākhyānaka, which was evidently a surname. Muni Dharmavijaya and Indravijaya, relying on the line infufasana: (quoted from Ratnaprabha Sūri's Upadeśa-mālāviseṣa-vṛtti in Peterson's Third Report, p. 168) are inclined to identify Siddhavyākhyanaka with Siddharşi who lived in Samvat 962 or 905 A.D. (as is evident from Peterson's Fourth Report, p. cxxix). There is another commentary on the Nyāyāvatāra by Haribhadra Sūri.
See Dr. R. G. Bhandarkar's Report 1883-84, p. 147.
• Vide Jainagama List, Bombay, p, 77, and Peterson's Third Report on Sanskrit MSS., Appendix. p. 9.