Vaishali Institute Research Bulletin 1

Author(s): Nathmal Tatia
Publisher: Research Institute of Prakrit Jainology & Ahimsa Mujjaffarpur

Page 12

INTRODUCTION
Siddhasena Divakara is an outstanding writer on Jaina logic and epistemology. The Noiyavat ära like other Dvâtrimśikās consists of thirty-two stanzas. It is a wonderful achievement that Siddhasena Divā kara has comprised within this short compass all the important problems of logic and epistemology in consonance with the fundamental Jaina tenets. Each verse is pregnant with deep significance and it was left to subscquent scholars who wrote commentaries upo this work to bring out the implications. Siddhasena did not propose to write a standard text book on Jaina epistemology. But he has taken full advantage of the works of Dignāga and of the Brāhmanical Nyaya school and criticised the Buddhist views in forcible language with cogent arguments. We have given a faithful rendering of the original verses and supplemented them with exhaustive exposition of the implications in the elucidation attached to each verse. Our interest is purely philosophical and we have noted the views of his predecessors and successors in order to make the recondite statements of Siddhasena intelligible to modern students of philosophy. We have followed the edition of Dr. P. L. Vaidya with the commentary of Siddharşi and the sub-commentary of Devabhadra Sūri. These two commentaries are very learned works and have gone deep into the import of the original text. In our elucidation we have exploited the commentaries to the fullest extent, though we have not given a literal rendering.
Siddhasena has criticised the Buddhist writers without express quotation of their names. There are pronounced resemblances with the wordings of Dignāga and also Dharmakīrti. Prof. Jacobi and Dr. P. L. Vaidya have expressed their views that Siddhasena criticises Dharmakirti. Prof. D. Malvania has given full quotations from the previous Buddhist writers to show that the views criticised are older than those of Dharmakīrti and that no decisive proof can be adduced to establish Divākara's posteriority to Dharmakīrti. Powerful arguments have been put forward to prove that Siddhasena Divakara is the author of the Sanmatitarka and of the Nyāyāvatāra and that he was not far removed from the time of Dignāga. We do not propose to enter into this chronological problem which has been discussed by Pt. Sukhlalji Sanghavi and Prof. D. Malvania, who have tried to vindicate their position against the views of Jacobi and Vaidya. We have