Vaishali Institute Research Bulletin 2

Author(s): G C Chaudhary
Publisher: Research Institute of Prakrit Jainology & Ahimsa Mujjaffarpur

Page 17

VAISHALI INSTITUTE RESEARCH BULLETIN NO. 2 (3) When were Dharmasāgariya and Kharatara-gaccha Pattā. valis composed, what are their sources, what is the reason for their mutual contradictions? Unless these questions are satisfactorily explained, how can the dates given by them be authoritative and how can Kalaka be taken as identical with Syāmācārya.
As far as the evidence is presented, it is not clear where Kalakacārya is called the author of the Prajñāpanāsūtra? To propose an identity of Syāma Arya with Kalaka Ācārya is catching, because
vāra' and 'kāla' mean black; but such a procedure is methodologically defective. To reach such a conclusion, we need independent sources to specify Syāmācārya as well as Kālakācārya as the authors of the Prajñāpanā : then alone identity can be proposed; and then the question of the date can be tackled.
Really speaking, it would be a great asset for the history of Jaina literature, if the composition of any Jaina work could be assigned to the second or first century before the Vikrama era. There is hardly any work in the available Jaina Prakrit literature which holds any prospects in this direction, because the linguistic tendencies there do not belong to the first stage of the Middle-Indo-Aryan, but they belong to the second stage which did not come into vogue prior to the second century of the Vikrama era. For instance, we have in the Panpavapā: loc. (loke), bhayavayā (bhagavatā), suya (śruta), diļļhivāya (dřstivāda) thii (sthiti), veyaņā (vedana); here intervocalic consonants are being lost replaced by ya-śruti. This tendency is not noticed in the Prakrit languages prior to the second century AD. The earlier phase of Prakrits is found in the Pāli Tripitaka, in the inscriptions of Asoka, Kháravela and those of the Sunga and Andhra dynasties and in the plays of Aśvaghoșa, where we do not notice the tendency of dropping the medial consonants. This tendency began after the second century, and this indeed became the distinguishing feature of Maharastrí (Prākst). As it is found in plenty in Jaina Prakrit literature Pischel and other scholars named the dialect of Jaina Prakrit works as Jain Mahārāşțrī and Jaina Sauraseni. In the light of this linguistic study, the composition of the Pappavaņā-sutta can in no way be assigned to the period earlier than the second century.
The claim that the Pannavapa is older than the Satkhapdagama is not indisputable. The points of agreement between these two works conclusively prove that both of them have a common heritage. This is true not only of these two works but also of all the canonical (including procanonical) works of the Digambara and Svetambara traditions and schools. Their soul is the same, but their body and physical structure are different. In this connection, the observation of Virasena
T
.