Yasastilaka and Indian Culture

SR No.: 001609
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: Krishnakant Handiqui
Publisher: Jain Sanskruti Samrakshak Sangh Solapur
Publication Year: 1968
Total Pages: 566
Language: English
Classification: Book_English, Story, Literature, & Culture
File Size: 16 MB

Page 410

CHAPTER XV
NON-JAINA CULTS, CUSTOMS AND BELIEFS
Among the non-Jaina cults mentioned in Somadeva's Yasastilaka the most prominent is, of course, that of Candamārī, which forms the starting point of the story. As we have already seen, human sacrifice was an essential feature of the worship of that goddess, and a detailed, though to some extent fantastic, description of her appallingly gruesome shrine occurs in Book I. Candamari is only another form of Candika, whose cult is much earlier than the tenth century, as is evident from the descriptions of the goddess and her blood-stained temple in works like Bāņa's Kadambari and Haribhadra's Samaraiccakaha, Book VI. In the latter work the deity is called also Katyayani and Kādambari. Subandhu in his Vasavadatta likewise refers to the shrine of Kātyāyani alias Canda while describing the city of Kusumapura or Pataliputra.' In Bhavabhūti's Malatimādhava, Act V, the goddess appears as Karālā or Camuṇḍa to whom a human victim is about to be offered by a Kāpālika. In Vakpati's Gauḍavaho she appears as Vindhyavasinī, to whom a lengthy hymn is addressed by Yasovarman (vv. 285-338), the goddess being called also Candi, Sabari and Nārāyaṇī. The hymn in question refers among other things to the human victim and the custom of selling human flesh, as in our work." The self-torture described by Somadeva as being practised by certain fanatics in the temple of Candamari3 is mentioned in another context in Bana's Harṣacarita (Book V), which refers, for instance, to the burning of Guggulu resin on the head while supplicating the Mahakala Siva, and the offering of flesh cut out of one's own body as an oblation in the fire. The offering of slices of one's own flesh to Camunda is mentioned in Uddyotana's Kuvalayamala composed in the eighth century. The Chinese traveller Yuan Chwang, in the first half of the seventh century, describes a temple, at Prayaga (Allahabad), where certain devotees committed suicide in the hope of gaining 'the paradise of the gods."
1 'यत्र भगवती कात्यायनी चण्डाभिधाना स्वयं निवसति '
2 'विससिज्जन्तमहापसुदंसण ( v. 319 ) ; 'सूरन्ति वीरविक्कयविक्कममिह जामिणी मसाणेसु' ( v. 327 ). The comm. remarks देवीश्मशाने वीरा सिद्धये महामांसविक्रयं कुर्वन्तीति कौलागमादिषु प्रसिद्धम्.
See Chap.
XIII for further details.
3 See Chap. II.
4 'अन्यत्र शिरोविधृतविलीय मानगुग्गुलुविकलन व सेवकानुनीयमानमहाकालम्, अपरत्र निशितशस्त्रोनिकृत्तात्ममांसहोमप्रसताप्तवर्गम्'
5 ' किंवा चामुण्डायाः पुरस्तीक्ष्णक्षुरिकाविदारितोरुयुगलसमुच्छललोहितपङ्किलभूतलं मांसखण्डैर्बलिं ददामि' Ratnapra
bha's Sanskrit version.
6
Watters: On Yuan Chwang, Vol. I. p. 362. A similar practice has been traced on the island of Mandhata in the Narmada, in the Nimar District of Central Provinces. Here, until recent times, devotees were in the habit of dashing themselves over