Jain Journal 1999 04

SR No.: 520134
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: Jain Bhawan Publication
Publisher: Jain Bhawan Publication
Publication Year: 1999
Total Pages: 58
Language: English
Classification: Magazine, India_Jain Journal, & India
File Size: 3 MB

Page 49

NAGARAJAIAH : ĀRĀDHANA-KARNĀȚA-ȚIKĀ
167 famous and popular that even the Sanskrit author had the inspiration to immitate its model. ii. Rāmacandra-mumuksu was well-versed in Kannada.
Bhrājisnu (c. 800 C.E.) is one of the earliest authors of Kannada literature of the extant works AKT olim Voddārādhane is the first work, in temporal terms, no other work, prose or poetry, earlier to this, has survived in Kannada. Bhrājisnu comes from Pallikheda, the modern Hallikheda in Bidar district; he lived and wrote at Malkhed olim Mānyakheța, the capital of Rāstrakūtas during the reign of GovindaIII (793-814). The work is composed mostly in the pre-old Kannada style that existed before ninth century C.E.
The great luminary Bhrājisnu is felicitous in Prakrit, adroit in Sanskrit and an adept in Kannada. His theme is religion and philosophy in which he is a connoisseur; but, basically Bhrājisnu is gifted with poetic craftsmanship. He is a born genius who conferred literary dignity on the spoken dialect of Kannada language by adopting it to the highest purposes of literary art. Pondering on the vanity of riches, the uncertainty of life, the spiritual previleges of Nirgrantha philosophy, Bhrājisnu effectively drives the reader to live lives of detachment and sobriety and to turn to introspection. The call to give up the terrestrial interests is so powerfully portrayed with the illustrations of the ideal life of the ascetics that it has the unmatched tranquilizing effect on the reader.
When most of the authors around him were busy in writing their works in Sanskrit, Bhrājisnu opted to write in Kannada; when his contemporary authors were after the verses in different metres, Bhrājisnu preferred the prose, that too a pithy Kannada which has no match to it in the entire hoard of Kannada works; Kannada prose saw its apogee in this work. The author has exploited the grandeur, brilliance, elegance and other possibilities of Kannada prose; it is almost a work of prose-poem.
Even piquant situations like the wife or mother lamenting over the separation of her husband or son, the prince leaving the entire property and accepting the vows of an ascetic, are carved to perfection in chaste Kannada language. For Bhrājisnu, language is tool, a brush to paint, a chisel to carve the wax and wane of the profane life which can be used as a ladder to reach a state of eternal bliss. It does not mean that there are no limitations in the work. For example, there are repetitions, but this is justifiable if we treat every story a seperate entity, then the question of repetition does not arise. But there are some portions,