Books and Papers

Author(s): A N Upadhye
Publisher: Hindi Granth Ratnakar

Page 45

30 A. N. UPADHYE
[II 5The paper opens with an explanation of the term Desī. Such words from Hemacandra's Dešinamamālā as are found in Kannada are discussed here. Here and there critical and etymological remarks are added.
5. Vidūşaka's Ears (I.H.Q., VIII, p. 793, Calcutta, 1932).
On the authority of a verse from the Paümacariü of Vimalasūri it is pointed out that Vidūsaka's head-dress was a sort of mask and that he wore wooden ears when he acted on the stage.
6. Mahāvīra and Buddha on Nirvāna (The Rajaramian,
Kolhapur, 1932; also the Voice of Ahimisa, VI, 3-4,
pp. 120–29, Aliganj, 1956). The religious background of the Vedic, Brahumanie and Upanishadic texts is outlined especially with a view to trace the doctrine of transmigration, which was conspicuous by its absence in earlier works but became sufficiently important in the Upanishads. Then the Upanishadic conception of Summum bonum is set forth and compared with that in the Sankhya and Yoga systems. One finds a big gap between the world of Upanishadic ideas and that of the earlier literature, and this ga) can be conveniently explained by postulating that the Āryans, all along their march from the Punjab to Central India, received much from the indigenous culture from Magadha and other territories which have been looked down upon by many passages in the Atharvaveda, etc. There is evidence in the Vedic literature itself that the Aryans had to struggle against an antagonistie culture in Central India as well as in Eastern India. It is to these parts of India that Jainism, Buddhisin and some other faiths belong. Their common points and their common differences from the Aryan form of religion indicate that they are the successors of an indigenous current of religious thought. It is in this background that the Jaina and Buddhistic conceptions of Nirvāņa are studied in details. Their metaphysical bases are shown to be slightly different. One reaches the conclusion that the Buddhistic Nirvana, as depicted in the Pāli canon, is not inuch different from the Jaina conception. It is the slippery metaphysical basis of Buddha's views that gave rise to manifold interpretations of Buddhist Nirvāņa.