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Whatever has been revealed by an analysis of the materials in the Jaina Ms. Suvarna - Raupya - Siddhi - Šāstra, etc. under the preparations of mercury, all that has been said by Nāgārjuna,! Padaliptasari, Carpata,3 Nātha,4 and other alchemists5 for the benifit of the people afflicted with diseases. A similar account of the preparations ef mercury for the benefit of people afflicted with diseases is given in other Indian works on Rasāyanavidyā with reference to Nāgārjuna and Siddha Carpața. There is a problem for the scholars to identify the Buddhist and Jaina Nāgārjuna and to determine his date in the history of Indian Alchemy.
Thc Jaina 'works the Suvarna - Raupya - Siddha - śāstra etc. on Alchemy as mentioned in the beginning are important treatises of the Iatrochemical period of India like other Indian works on the same problem. They are comprehensive and purely chemical works .dealing with many operations of mercury and various chemical processes are incidentally described, a good deal of which, however overlaps each other as they are found in other Indian works10 on alchemy in the Middle Ages.
The authors of the Jaina Ms. Survarna - Raupy - Siddhi - Šāstra etc. as devout Jaina monks begin their works with an adoration of Gautama, Ganesa, 11 and the Tirthaņkara Mahāvira12 and even symobilze Mahāvīra with mercury as Śiva is symbolized with mercury13 in the Hindu Alchemy. .1 SRSS., ch. I. 60. 2. Ivid., ch. II. 4 (Pālittaya = padalipta). 3. Ibid., ch. I. 24, I. 14, 15, 17, 26, 60. 4. Ibid., ch. I. 18, 24, 5. Ibid., ch II. Sekham Ali (Ch, I. 60) MS B. 6, Rasārņava, Rasaratnākara by Nityanatha, Rasaratnasamuccaya of Vagbhata etc.
Vide Hindu Chemistry, Dr. P. C. Ray, P. 159 and Pracīna Bharat Men Rasayan ka
Vikasa, Dr. Satyaprakāśa, Fourth Khanda. See also Rasaratnākara by Nagarjuna. 7. Rasaratnasaumuccaya by Vāgbhata, Rasarajalaksmi of Vishnudeva, Rasanak
satramallika by Matharasimha Rasaratnakara; by Siddha Nityanātha, Rasendrasārasamgraha of Gopalakrishna, Rasendra Kalpadruma, Dharuratnamālā, Rasakaumudi,
Bhāvaprakasa of Bhāva Misra, Dhatukriya. Arkaprakāśa of Rāvana, etc. 8. SRSS,, Ch. I. 56, II. 7., III. 12. 13, 18, 22, 24, IX 5, 21, etc
Rasaratnasamuccaya of Mānikyandevasuri, Paradavidhi 9. The chemical processes of making gold, Silver iron, mercury, copper killing of
mercury, tin, etc. of making medicines, Ibid.. 10. See Rasarnava, Rasaratnasamuccaya, etc., Vide Hindu chemistry and Pracin Bharat
men Rasayanak ikVāsa Forth, part, Iatro Chemical period. 11. SRSS., Ch. I 1 Sri Gautamaya namah. 12. Ibid., Ch. I 1 (MS-B) (Sri Gaņeśaya namab.) 13. Ibid.) Ch. 2, 3, 4 6 (Dhyānājjnesa, etc.). 14. "Pancabhūtatamakah Sūtastisthatyeva Sadasivah" II, Rasārnava. XIII. 78.
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2014,
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