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He at once concluded that this must be the Saint He fell at the feet of the Saint and made a most bumble and beart-felt entreaty that the work was beyond his poor layman's wits and that the saint should oblige him and the world by completing the book, the first aphorism of which bad been corrected by the Saint in such a providential manner The Saint was moved by compassion and finished the book
This Saint was none other than our Umasvamı, and the completed book is Tatyartha Sutra,
The book is an exposition of the 7 Principles of Jainism, i, e, the 7 Tatvas
The opening Sutra serves the purpose of an Introduction, Justification and Recapitulation of the whole book It was necessary to indicate the position of the Principles (Tatva in the whole range of Jain Knowledge Ther are the subject-matter of right belief, and the relation of the two can not be appreciated fully unless we consider the position of right belief in the scheme of Jain philosophy This position is indicated by the first Sutra This brings us to the Justification also The first purpose of everything Living is Happiness to be worth anything must be eternal, faultless and independent. Such happiness is identical with the Jaina conception of Liberation. Right belief in and right knowledge of the 7 Principles, along with a life led in the light of the knowledge, and firmly established on the basis of the belief is the sole threefold path of final and everlasting deliver ance Thus the first Sutra is a justification of the book which deals with these basic principles of belief and action. It is also a Recapitulation, because the whole book can easily be seen to be merely an expansion of the various aspects, details and developments of this mighty and all comprehensive Sutra of Jainism
The ground-plan of the book itself admits of analysis as follows
The whole book consists of 357 Sutras, divided into 10 chapters with 33, 53, 39, 42, 42, 27, 39, 26, 47, and 9 Sutras respectively.
