Vaishali Institute Research Bulletin 2

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

Page 56

THE TRAIRAŚIKAS AND THE VAIŠEŞIKAS 47 Śrīgupta and Rohagupta were conversant with the Vaiseșika categories and Śrīgupta did not object to frame the questions on the basis of the Vaišeșika categories as Rohagupta had a special liking for them.
The two more verses in the Viseșāvašyakabhāşya deserve careful consideration in this connection.
teņābhiņivesāto samativikappilapalattham atayal vaisesiyam paņītam phātikatam annamannehim// nāmeņa rohagutto gotteņālappale sa coluol darvāti chappatatthovudesanato chatuottil/
Op. cit., 2989-90. These mean to say that Rohagupta was the name of the scholar belonging to the Aulukya Gotra. He was called Saduluka as he explained the six categories viz. dra vya etc. He, out of devotion and on the basis of his own imagination wrote a treatise on the Vaišeşika tenets which were (earlier 1) elaborated by others.
This may at first sight suggest that the Vaiseșikadarśana was first promulgated by Rohagupta. But there are other considerations which stand in the way of accepting this position. The Vaišesikasūtras are pre-Buddhistic in date. A Chinese tradition places Kanada eight hundred years before the Buddha. There may be exaggeration in this supposition. But as there is not the slightest trace of the Buddhist and Jaina tenets in the Vaišeşikadarśana and as there are references to it in ancient works like the Anuyogadvara, Nandi, Lankā vatārasūtra and Lalitavistara etc, it is highly probable that the Darśana came into existence in an earlier date than supposed here.
It is from later Jaina works that we learn about a huge Vaišeşika literature after Kanāda and before Prasastapāda. There was a Várttika called the Vákya, there were bhāşyas, a commentary called Kațandi, a Bhāşyaţika by Prasastapāda of which a digest in the form of the Padárthadharmasamgraha is extant. The Treatment of the Vaisesika tenets in Jinabhadra's work refers to a post-Kanāda and pre-Prasastapāda position. It should be considered in this connection that no other authority except Jinabhadra and his commentators evince any knowledge of and connection of Rohagupta with the Vaiseșika system.
We may therefore conclude that Rohagupta's work was a digest of the Vaiseşikadarśana of Kanada and it went into oblivion due to the imaginary elements unacceptable to the orthodox Vaiseşikas added to it by him.