________________
Johannes Bronkhorst, Kundakunda versus Samkhya on the Soul
223
The preceding analysis of the thought of the Samayasāra reveals a vision of the place of the soul in the world and of its place on the path to liberation that is coherent and credible. This depiction of the self does not "very much resemble that of the Upanisadic and Advaitic Brahman or Atman", as it has been claimed.25 It resembles the self of Samkhya in some respects, but differs from it in certain others, voluntarily so, as we have seen. Nor do I see any reason to look upon the Samayasara as a "heterogeneous repository of accumulated Digambara teaching. [...] rather than the imperfectly preserved work of an individual heterodox philosopher".26 This is not to deny that its author used traditional material, nor do I wish to claim that he was necessarily a complete innovator. But in reading the Samayasara, I do have the impression of being confronted with the work of someone who wished to incorporate into Jainism a notion that had become very fruitful and useful in other currents, primarily Samkhya, but also elsewhere. The author of the Samayasara is explicit about his concern to take over the central idea of Samkhya, at the same time improving upon it. In order to do so, he had to think out a competing system, an attempt in which he succeeded to at least some extent. The fact that the Samayasara can, by and large, be read as a text expressive of a coherent thesis is the best argument there could be to maintain that it had one single author, whether he was called Kundakunda or otherwise.27
Some other works ascribed to Kundakunda represent by and large the same thesis as the one propounded in the Samayasara. The Pravacanasāra, in particular, has some verses that state in so many words that the soul can be active, but only in its own domain. According to Pravacanasära II.92,
25
"The self, making its own nature, becomes the agent of its own bhava, but not the agent of all the bhavas that consist of material substance."28
Two verses further, the same text states:
"The [self], now being the agent of its own modification born from its [own] substance, is sometimes taken [and sometimes] freed by the dust of karma."
Singh, 1974: 85, as cited by Johnson (1995: 238). Nor do Kundakunda's teachings resemble early Advaita Vedanta, as claimed by Dhaky (1991), referred to in Dundas, 2002: 291 n. 52. 26 Johnson, 1995: 265.
27 Johnson (1995: 111) does not seem to think otherwise: "as far as I know, the upayoga doctrine does not appear in this form in any recorded source prior to Kundakunda. Indeed, commentators frequently remark upon the peculiarity, or uniqueness of Kundakunda in this respect. For all hermeneutic purposes, therefore, he must be taken as the originator of this particular form of the upayoga doctrine."
28 Pravacanasara II.92: kuvvam sabhāvam ādā havadi hi kattā sagassa bhāvassa / poggaladavvamayāṇam ṇa du kattā savvabhāvāṇam // (Sanskrit: kurvan svabhāvam ātmā bhavati hi kartā svakasya bhāvasya / pudgaladravyamayānām na tu kartā sarvabhāvānām //).
