Scientific Contents in Prakrta Canons

Author(s): N L Jain
Publisher: Parshwanath Vidyapith

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: Scientific Contents in Prākṛta Canons
intermediate links between the Iranian and Indian languages. The above description leads us to state the geneaology of main Aryan languages in this continent as below:
Euro-Asian Zone
Indo-European Family
Indo-Iranian Sub-group
Indo-Aryan Branch
Präkṛta, Pāli and Samskṛta
Prākṛta Language
The Prākṛta, Pāli and Samskṛta languages fall under the Indian sub-group of Indo-Iranian group. These are the important languages of the world. We will refer here to the Prākṛta language specifically.
The Prakṛta language is found by different names in literature. Muni Nagarāja9 has mentioned at least ten such names from different sources including Sthänānga. Bharata has mentioned its name as Prākṛta. Hemacandra, Singhadeva Gani, Dhanika, Nārāyaṇa, Sankara and others have advocated the origin of Präkṛta from Samskṛta assuming it to be the basic language per chance predominant at their times. However, this opinion is not supported by earlier Jaina and non-Jaina scholars. Rudrața, Siddhasena Diwakara, Vākpatirāja, Rajasekhara ( 89th century) and contemporary commentators like Nami-Sādhu postulate it as the earlier, native, natural and unpolished language. And therefore, this might be the philological origin of Samskrta. This is much more logical than the earlier view. Moreover, a grammatised language cannot originate others. The current scholars express surprise, on the one hand, on the view of Hemacandra on the basis of his idea of the nativity of Prākṛta in his other works and on the other, they guess about his intention on the ground of time and study. Prākṛta means natural, simple, elegant, beautiful, pleasant and popular language.
There is, however, another opinion that Vedic and Chandas language is the earliest and oldest literary language.