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Studies in Haribhadrasuri
here.70 The Pañca-sūtra appears to be his latest one, or one of the latest compositions.
With reference to the chronological order of Haribhadrasūri's works, Prof. K. V. Abhyankar records his opinion and remarks that most probably he composed his commentaries first, then followed the Dharma-kathās, and then the works like the Anekānta-jaya-patākā, the Loka-tattva-nirnaya and others propounding the Jainism. Thereafter he composed the philosophical works like the Şad-darśana-samuccaya, the Sāstravārtā-samuccaya, the Pañcāśaka, then the works teaching Yoga, such as the Yoga-bindu, the Yoga-drsti-samuccaya, etc. And at the end when his wisdom had matured he composed the works like the Vimsati-Vissatikā, and others propounding his own interpretation and the essence of the scriptures and a collection of thoughts pertaining to various topics.71 Among them, he might have composed the Pañca-sūtra with his auto-commentary, thus trying his hand at abstracting in his treatise the essential topics elucidated in the preceding ones. For a clearer perception of the sequence of his works it can be guessed that he may have composed his works in the following chronological order: the Pañcāsaka, the Viņšikā, the Sodasaka, the Astaka, and the Pañcasūtraka.
Finally, it may be added that Haribhadrasūri enjoys a unique position in the field of Jainology as the author of supposedly 1,444 works, though only a few of his excellent philosophical works, a few commentaries, and a few of his smaller treatises with numerals like pañca, asta, sodaśa, viņśati, etc. in the titles have survied today.
