The Doctrine of the Jainas, Described after the Old Sources c5.41

c5.41

§ 6. The ‘classical’ Sanskrit commentary to the Śvetāmbara canon represents the climax of a vast scholastic literature. Its predecessors in Prakrit, the Nijjuttis and Cuṇṇis, were, for a long time, neglected by scholars. We might even say that, in a certain sense, this is still true to-day, for the publications of Cuṇṇis issued in the course of the last decades do not contain even the slightest illustrative or critical addition, though the merits of Muni JINAVIJAYA Acharya in laying them before the reader are indisputable. It was nearly half a century earlier (1892) that LEUMANN, on the ground of his own subtle investigations based not upon prints but upon manuscripts, has shown (ZDMG 46, p. 586) the importance of those voluminous products for not only Jain dogmatics but for the history of literature in general. Unfortunately the author did not pursue those researches he had characterized as “indispensible for the exploration of the Jain literature of several centuries”, pointing out that the Kathās in the old commentaries often appear in non-Jinistic works. Still we possess his “Āvaśyaka-Erzählungen” (AKM 10, 2; 1897) which after the most subtle examination of the best manuscripts give the pure text of those old moral illustrations. It is a point of regret that no more than but four forms of that work should have been printed and that a continuation, though promised, should never have seen the light of the day. It was younger recensions of Jain stories that were translated and explored as to their motives and their importance for comparative history of literature by HERTEL and others. In his essay “On the Literature of the Shvetambaras of Gujarat” (1922) we find the following remarkable passage: “During the middle-ages down to our own days the Jains and especially the Śvetāmbaras of Gujarat, were the principal story-tellers of India. Their literature contains, in huge masses, the materials which the students of folklore, who wish to do true scientific work, should thoroughly study in preference to all the other Indian narrative literature.” But HERTEL did not leave any doubt that in his opinion not even the preliminary condition, i.e. of critical texts and precise translations was fulfilled. As to his intrinsic studies of the Kathānakas for which he succeeded to produce parallels even from non-Indian sources, the reader is referred to WINTERNITZ’ History of Indian Literature Vol. 2.