Some Jaina Canonical Sutras c10.4

c10.4

The title of the *sūtra* implies that it presents in a nutshell the contents of all the *angas*, the fourteen *puvvas* and a few other texts of the canon besides the principal tenets of Jainism. In view of the fact that the *sūtra* includes even its own contents, one cannot help doubting that the text in its extant form retains its earlier identity. The suspicion about its later transformation increases when we find that it speaks of the eighteen later developments of the *Brāhmī* script, and enumerates the thirty-six sections of the *Uttarajjhayana* besides giving the contents of the *Nandī sūtra*. It is equally important to note that the idea given of the extent of the *angas* is not quite the same as that of the texts in their present form. The main importance of the *sūtra* is therefore mainly historical in so far as it throws light not only on the subject-matters of the fourteen *puvvas* and the twelfth *anga*, which are lost beyond recovery, but also on the earlier extent of the *angas* forming the principal texts of the Śvetāmbara Jain Canon. This *sūtra* contains the enumeration of the two *rāsīs* and their sub-divisions, two types of hellish creatures, etc. It also deals with three Vedas (*purisa, itthī* and *napumsaka*), twenty-four *Tīrthankaras*, nine *Vāsudevas* and nine *Baladevas*, etc.