History and Doctrines of the Ajivikas: A Vanished Indian Religion c21.s2.1

c21.s2.1

Buddhist and Jaina texts and commentaries contain fragments in verse and prose which appear to be adaptations or quotations from Ājīvika sources and may indeed be paraphrases of the scriptures of the sect. The very important passage in the *Sāmañña-phala Sutta*,¹ already quoted, with its Māgadhisms and its impressive simile of the ball of thread, may well be authentic. Another such passage may be the story of the merchants in the *Bhagavatī Sūtra*,² which Gosāla is said to have told to the monk Ānanda, and which may have been borrowed by the Jaina author from an Ājīvika collection of *jātakas* or cautionary tales.