Kahakosu

SR No.: 001367
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: Shreechandmuni
Publisher: Prakrit Text Society Ahmedabad
Publication Year: 1969
Total Pages: 675
Language: Apbhramsa, Prakrit, Hindi, Sanskrit
Classification: Book_Devnagari & Story
File Size: 10 MB

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The next work of Sricandra is the Kahakosu or the Kathakośa edited here. It has in all 53 Saṁdhi, and the total number of Kadavakas comes to 1025. The number of Kaďayakas in different Samdhis varies from 10 (in Samdhi 31) to 32 (in Samdhi 41). It is written in Apabhramśa with different metres and interspersed with quotations in Sanskrit and Prākrit. The number of Samdhis does not correspond to the number of stories and the latter are often vivisected by the Samdhi divison, for instance the 12th Saṁihi is completed just in the middle of the story that is being narrated.
In the opening Kadavakas Šricandra broods over the fleeting character of worldly life and its attractions. He modestly says that he does not know much, but it is his deep devotion towards religion that induced him to undertake the difficult task of composing Kathākośa on which saint-poets of yore had tried their hand. He anounces, almost in the manner of Purāņas, that the Kathakośa has descended from Jinendra, i.e., Mahāvira to Ganadharas, and through Gañadhara to Sreņika ; Sivakoti-munindra narrated it in the present age, the pañcama-kāla ; and from Teacher to Teacher (guru-kramena) it has reached the author who is narrating it here.
The Gathās of Mūlārādbanā, the study of which paves the path of heaven and liberation, contains so many nice and interesting stories. Śricandra, as he puts it, would first interpret the Gāthās and then give the stories connected with them. Without the proper context nothing would be intelligible : it is necessary, therefore, that the stories should be given only after the Gātās are explained. A painting presupposes a wall; so also the narration of a story must be preceded by an understanding of the Gathā on which the story is based. Taking that line (Sivakodi- munimdim etc) literally, one would be tempted to suggest that
me Kathakośa was composed by Sivakoți ; but after reading the whole Kadavaka together, one would not be justified in attributing any work like that to Sivakoti. The knowledge of a fund of tales was possessed by Sivakoti w'10 consequently has referred to many stories in the Gāthās of Mülarānhanā, or as it is popularly called, the Bhagavati Aradhana. 16 To begin with Sricandra explains its first two Gathās; and on the second he gives the tales of Bharata etc. in Apabhramsa. He pic only those Gathās on which the stories are to be illustrated, explains their literal meaning in Sanskrit, and then gives short and long tales in Apabhramśa. Possibly he complains against his predecessors that he/they did not give these Gāthās, but narrated only the stories : in a way his is a commendable procedure, but he has not stuck to it upto the end of his work. As far as Samdhis 43, the Gathās of Mülārāc given and explained at the beginning of every story, but in the remain