Studies in the Origins of Buddhism c22.1

c22.1

The Jaina Canon, its History and Authenticity.—Mahāvīra is traditionally supposed to have taught the fourteen Puvvas to the Gaṇadharas. These “original” texts are, however, according to the Digambaras, lost without a trace. According to the Śvetāmbaras, their remnants i.e. the first ten Puvvas, which Bhadrabāhu permitted Sthūlabhadra to reveal to others,¹ were, in the Council at Pāṭaliputra, combined to form the twelfth Aṅga, the Diṭṭhivāya. But in the centuries that followed the council this twelfth Aṅga also got lost. Some little information about its contents is apparently preserved in the Samavāyaṅga, the Nandī and the Cheḍasūtras. From these it appears that of the five divisions of the Diṭṭhivāya only the third dealt with the Puvvas proper. Obviously the Diṭṭhivāya was more than a mere summary of the Puvvas. In any case, we can hardly be certain that any authentic information about the fourteen Puvvas has survived in these references to the contents of the Diṭṭhivāya.²