Shataka Trayadi Subhashit Sangraha

SR No.: 002915
Original Sutra Author: Bhartuhari
Author: Dharmanand Kosambi
Publisher: Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan
Publication Year: 1948
Total Pages: 346
Language: Hindi, English
Classification: Book_Devnagari & Literature
File Size: 22 MB

Page 18

FOREWORD
FII
many centuries so backward, and by means of which the common people of India liave become dull, heavy, and uninspired. Whenever the opportunity presented itself, he expressed this opinion of his without fear or hesitation, Because of this, his revolutionary thought and progressive activity were not appreciated by the selfish and conservative class of Brahmins, in particular the Brahmins of Mahārāstra. He was an ardent disciple of the Mahātmā, all of whose efforts towards the regeneration of the country he praised as well as preached and spread. He lived out his life in the manner of a true Bodhisattva and ended it in the same fashion.
** Thus, Dharmanandji was a matchless and extraordinary personification of scholarship in our age.
I see the marked influence of a father bearing so striking a character upon his worthy son Babā Kosambi. It is a fruit of this influence that I interpret his entrance into the deep study of Sanskrit literature and his meticulous work of editing the present book with an effort which would have been regarded as of excessive duration for such a result. As I have said before, Bābā's principal subject is the science of Mathematics. It is his chief purpose in life to study, to teach, and to do research in that subject. Sanskrit was neither his principal study nor his field of teaching, Nevertheless, the concentration, perseverance, absorption and enthusiasm which he has displayed in the critical study of his present work has astounded even me and has often made me wish to ask him “Baba, why are you losing your mind and spending your precious time as well as energy in this line?"
Three or four years ago when Dharmānandji, first of all, came to me to bring news of the Bhartrhari edition being taken in hand in this manner and said that Bābā has nearly lost his mind in the work, I laughed heartily and replied that some of the father's traits must certainly have come to the son. But even his narrative did not give ine a proper idea of how truly Babá was losing himself. However, when I saw his preparations for the editorial work on this volume and acquainted myself with the extent to which he had, for the sake of this work, borne with joy and enthusiasm every kind of financial, bodily, and mental hardship, only then did I realise the magnitude both of the task before him and of his labours. Before seeing this work of Bäbā I too had no idea that the three centuries of Bhartrhari would necessitate this type of research and editorial work. Although I had mernorised hundreds of Bhartshari's epigrams at the beginning of my own studies and then several hundreds of Bhartshari manuscripts had passed through my hands in the inspection of well-kept Jain manuscript Bhāụdars, nevertheless I had no idea that in the determination of a clear and definitive text there was involved the same tangled problem as in the text-criticism of the Mahābhārata and the Pascatantra. The importance of this problem was made clear to me only when I saw the more than 400 large collation sheets