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Vasi-camdana-kappo
A. N Upadbye, Kolhapur.
AW
Very often in Prakrit, Pali and Sanskrit works we come across an idea expressed by the phrase vasi-camdana-kappo (in Prakrit) which qualifies a great monk who is fully balanced in his attitudes. The object of this paper is to put together a few passages and to ascertain the precise meaning of this expression.
(1) In the Kalpasutra,while describing Mahavira the phrase vasi-camdanakappo 18 used to pualify him The Sutra runs thus
___ से णं भगवं वासावासबन्ज अट गिम्हहेमंतिए मासे गामे एगराइए नगरे पंचराइए वासीचंदणसमाणकप्पे समतिणमणिलेठुकंचरणे समदुपनसुहे इहलीगपरलोगअप्पडिबद्ध जीवियमरणे य निरवकले संसारपारगामी कम्मसत्तनिग्धापणगए अन्सुछिए एवं च णं विहरइ ॥११॥ Jacobi has translated the above passage in this manner
"The venerable one lived, except in the rainy season, all the eight months of summer and winter, in villages only a single night, in towns only five nights, he was indifferent alike to the smell of ordure and of sandal (italics mine), to straw and jewels dirt and gold, pleasure and pain, attached neither to this world for to the beyond, desiring peither life por death, arrived at the other shore of the samsara, and he exerted bimself for the suppression of the defilement of Karman."
(2) A similar passage occurs in the description of the immediate ascetic pupils of Mahavira in the Aupapatikasutra (Sutra 29)
(3) While describing the characteristics of a great Muni, the Uttaradhyayana says (XIX. 92).
