| Research Abstract |
This study aims at Japanese translation of the original text of the Uttarajjhaya, written in Ardha-Magadhi and is hard to interpret. The focus is located on the earliest Jaina precepts, doctorines, ethics, and so on.
Through my translation, there were many difficulties for me in order to translate the Ardba-Magadhi text into Japanese. One of the difficulties lies in the structure of language. So as to understand the unresolved words of Ardha-Magadhi, I made a contrast table of the padas of the Uttarajjhaya with parallels from the Acaranga, Suyagada, Dasaveyaliya, Isibhasiyaim, Suttanipata and Dhammapada. The examination of the close equivalent words among the parallel padas and the parallel gathas (occurred in other texts) are indispendable to resolve the meanings of difficult words of Ardha-Magadhi.
Moreover, Charpentier's edition of the Uttarajjhaya is not the critical edition. Although he justified his editorial principle based on Devendra's commentary (on the ground that his own authority might be superior even to that of any other manuscript), it still must be the metre that is invaluable help of textual criticism : he disregards the metre.
I have fully realized the necessity of both critical edition and translation. In order to make some achievement on this aspect, my colleagues (Dr. M. Miyao and Dr. Y. Ousaka, expert of computer science) and I are trying to make the index and the reverse index according to the Prakrit word-order and trying to analyze the metre of the Uttarajjhaya.
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