Prolegomena to Prakritica et Jainica

Author(s): Satyaranjan Banerjee
Publisher: Asiatic Society

Page 78

BANERJEE: JAIN RELIGION IN A HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVE 61
Christian era that we have some Digambara writers who contributed a lot to the cause of Jainism. The first among them was Kundakunda (1st or 3rd century A.D.) who wrote many books, Pravacanasara, Niyamasāra, Samayasara, Pañcāstikāyasāra, Prabhṛta-traya or Saratraya and so on. These books of Kundakunda were, of course, the earliest, while the other literature followed him. This was the first secular Digambara literature as far as we know. Today, of course, many Digambara literature like Kaṭṭigeyāṇuvekkhā and Vaṭṭakera's Mulācāra, Sivārya's Bhagavati-arādhanā, Yativṛṣabhācārya's Tiloyapannatti were published from many places and Jainism spread throughout the length and breadth of South India. Starting from Karnataka, it spread to Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Mysore and Kerala as well. The Jain influence had not been very appreciable in Kerala till then.
It is to be noted this connection that enormous literature in different languages had been developed in the south. Starting from the literature in the Prakrit language, we have the Jain literature in Kannada, Telugu and in Tamil. Tamil and Kannaḍa have a lot of literature on Jainism. Most of the Kannaḍa literature till very recently was found on Jainism and also on Jain philosophy. Till about the 10th century A.D. there was no separate Mālāyālam Jain literature, but subsequently we did have some Mālāyālam literature as well. It was after the 8th century that Adi Sankara introduced many Sanskrit words into Mālāyālam and the languages like Telugu and Kannada started having the influence of 'Manipravalanaya'. Tamil, however, has retained its original identity even till today, though the Sanskrit influences on Tamil can be found even now. It is this background that we need to understand the Jain religion in the South.
At a much later time, three of the Digambara writers became famous, and they were Pujyapada Devanandin, Samantabhadra and Akalankadeva.