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 77

58
YAŠASTILAKA AND INDIAN CULTITRE
dressed in an attire exactly like that of Lord Siva disguised as the Kirāta hunter. He was the son of the chief panegyrist Katakädhipati (Campcommander), the son-in-law of the minstrel Subhata-sauhārda (Friend of Warriors ), the grandson of the jester Srutriyakitava (Brahmana Gambler). and the refuge of all who had transgressed their vows. His food and emoluments were marned by arranging the nuptials of all the harlots', and he had endowments of hornless cows and she-buffaloes registered in his favour in all the dairy farms. The glory of his wisdom and knowledge of mystic formulas and rites was proclaimed in the following manner by religious mendicants, carrying sticks and deerskins, and acting as informers, with bodies made ugly by excessive decorations: 'Here is the Exalted One who has communed with the Mahāyoginis and acquired supersensuous knowledge. He has attained spiritual perfection, and his utterances are unfailingly true. By his art of enchantment he can unite even a lion with an elephant, and by means of animosity-producing drugs he can make even & mother an enemy of her children!'
The picture of the elephant-driver in Book IV is a minute study in ugliness, which is emphasized in such a manner as to suggest the enormity of the queen's strange infatuation. He is described as sleeping on the floor of a thatched hut strewn with grass left over from the ration of elephants, resting his head on a heap of coiled up ropes serving as a pillow. His only clothing was a piece of rag used for rubbing elephants with oil. He had coarse thornlike hair; ears like old shoes; eyes like the mouth of a bucket; lips like the fringe of a leather oil-flask gnawed off by rats; cheeks like the hollow of an age-worn tree; teeth protruding like an irregular row of cowries; a chin hardly visible, as he had a regular goat's beard ;3 a throat with the veins visible, resembling the trunk of a castor-oil plant; arms like a couple of dead serpents suspended from on high ; a stomach bloated like inflated billows; and thighs like stakes damaged by fire. 'He was repulsive to sight like a mass of sins, and extremely disgusting like a charnel-field.
ed to be a compact mass of iron rust in human shape, and fashioned by the Creator by combining all kinds of deformities.' The original passage runs as follows (Chap. IV, p. 42):
___ कटङ्करकुटीरके करिकवलावशिष्टयवसम्रस्तरिणि* अवगुण्ठितरजुपुञ्जपरिकल्पितशिरस्पदे निद्रायन्तम्, इभाभ्यङ्गकर्पेटपिहितलज्जास्थानम् अतिकठिनकचकण्टकोइमरमुण्डमण्डलम्, अनवानुपदीनापटलसमश्रवसम्,......उदञ्चनशुषिरातिशायिलोचनम्,...... उन्दुरविकर्तरितसंघाटतटतुलितोभयदशनवसनम्, अतिपुराणकुजकोटरप्रतिमल्लगल्लन् , असमस्थापितवराटकविकटदन्तम् , अज GETFT 703 EG -4 itera ,...... tak TETTER T
1 Srutasāgara says पुनर्भूणां पुंश्चलीनां संग्रहस्त्रीविधवानाम्. 2 Obviouly employed by the court. 3 969 Cf, the Greek phrase pogon mala tragikos (Lucian, The Dream, 10). 4 This is the reading of Ms. A, The printed text reads...qerfarinfo.
(Lacian, The Dream, co