Dhammakahanuogo

SR No.: 001954
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: Kanhaiyalal Maharaj, Dalsukh Malvania
Publisher: Agam Anuyog Prakashan
Total Pages: 810
Language: Prakrit
Classification: Book_Devnagari, Agam, Canon, Story, Literature, & agam_related_other_literature
File Size: 20 MB

Page 22

sections should be understood on the same pattern. The same thing is noticed in the Antagadadasão. The accounts narrated in the first four divisions of the text, barring a few, have been described on the same pattern, the model being the story of prince Goyama. The last four divisions contain the accounts of the wives of Krsna Väsudeva and the king Sreņika Bimbasāra and some lay disciples. The accounts have been presented in a steriotyped pattern and an allusion is made to the earlier stories. These accounts are monotonous and it appears that the gaps have been filled in somehow.
These steriotyped patterns are often presented merely with a skeleton and the rest is left to be filled in with a set of words and phrases, ending with the word Vāva' (yāvat). For instance, the Oväiya, the first Upānga, gives full description of the city of Campā, shrine Puņnabhadda and a forest. Now if some other city, or a shrine or a forest is to be described in some other canonical text, the description is to be inserted from this canon.
Such descriptions, known as vannaa (varņaka) when given in full are characterised by long compounds and belong to the earlier portions of the Jain canon. These descriptions are related to a king, a queen, a merchant, a caravan leader, a rich householder, a warrior, a pious man, dreams, pregnancy-whim, birth, wedding, marriage gifts, monk's visit to a town, listening to his sermons, seeking permission of parents to enter the ascetic order, renunciation ceremony, practising penence and so on, and are always described in exactly the same words.?
Prakrit Jain narrative literature is also rich with motifs which reflect a state of culture through which it has passed. The study of these motifs is helpful in tracing the common origin of world-wide story literature. Traditional beliefs such as the fruit of past deeds, recollection of previous birth, claiming the reward of the penitential acts (nidana), the kindness rewarded and cruelty punished, good luck and bad luck, omens, superstitions, cure by spells and incantations, the pregnancy-whim of eating the flesh from one's own husband's belly and its satisfaction by artificial means, flying of horses, abandonment of born children, washing forehead of maidservants, smelling of head and so on, not only reveal a prehistory of tale-types but also add to the beauty of narrative. These motifs are recorded not only in Sanskrit and Apabhramsa but also in medieval literature of Indian languages such as Jyotirisvara's Varnaratnākara (14th century A.D.), Varnasamuccaya (edited by B.J. Sandesara) and others. 1. Such descriptions of steriotyped pattern are compared with certain phrases and descriptions of situations occuring again and again exactly in the same words in the Avadana-Sataka of the Buddhists. One such longest steriotyped piece can be seen in the description of the simile with which the Buddha utters the prophecy that somebody will become a Buddha, Winternitz, ibid, 280f. 2. The following descriptions can be noted: (i) The conception etc. of prince Goyama described in the Antagada (1. 1-10) is to be inserted from that of Mahabbala in the Bhagavati (11. 11), Dhammakahānuoga, II, 20 (ii) The departure of prince Goyama to visit Aristanemi, narrated in the Antagada (1.1-10) is to be inserted from that of Megha in the Näyä (1), Dhamma, p.21 (iii) The performance of austerities of the householder Makăi, described in the Antagada is to be inserted from that of Khandaga in the Bhagavati (2.1), Dhamma, 92 (iv) Listening to the sermons of Tirtharikara Vimala in the Bhagavati (11.11) is to be inserted from that of Jamali in the Bhagavati (9.33), Dhamma, 10 (v) The initiation of Aimuttakumära mentioned in the Bhagavati (5.4) is to be inserted from that of a similar description elsewhere, Dhamma, 67 (vi) The description of the city of Rāyagiha and the shrine Gunasilaya in the Näyā (1) is to be inserted from a similar description elsewhere, Dhamma, 68 3. See Jagdishchandra Jain, Prakrit Narrative Literature. 1981, ch. II pp. 41-85