Bruhat Katha kosha

Author(s): Harishen Acharya,
Publisher: Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan

Page 76

INTRODUCTION
Some of the
connected with Bhoja, Vikrama, Kālidāsa, Śreņika etc. topographical references are quite modern, and stories are associated with towns like Delhi, Champaner and Ahmedabad. On the whole the contents are instructive as well as amusing.1
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Kathārņava: The Isimandala or the Rṣimandala-stotra of Dharmaghosa (c. 13th century A. D.) is a Prakrit poem containing 208 to 218 verses offering salutations to Jaina celebrities including Salakāpurusas and their great contemporaries devoted to religious life, Pratyeka-buddhas, legendary heroes like Jinapalita, ascetic heroes like Metarya, and eminent post-Mahāvīra teachers about whom casual biographic details are mentioned. Most of them are found in the canonical texts, Niryuktis and Prakirņakas. What appeared like legendary characters from a didactic tale, an edifying story or a narrative parable are treated here almost as ascetic heroes or actual personalities belonging to the Jaina church. It was incumbent on the commentators to explain these verses by giving the biographies of persons referred to in the Stotra. More than half a dozen Vṛttis are available on this text: the Ms. of the earliest is dated Samvat 1380 and that of the latest Samvat 1670. Pattan Collection has got a Bṛhadvṛtti in Prakrit on this text. The Vṛtti of Padmamandira of the Kharataragaccha is called Kathārņava (-anka), and it was composed in Samvat 1553 or A. D. 1496. It explains the verses and gives all the stories in Sanskrit verses usually Anustubh. Some verses of the text (for instance Nos. 154-160, opening of the third Amsa) are pronounced by Padmamandira as parakṛta or later additions.
Kathavali: This is a huge work in Prakrit prose written by Bhadresvara, and so far there is only one Ms. of it at Pattan. The date of the Ms. is Samvat 139 (the last cipher is broken off) according to Jacobi, but according to Dalal it is Samvat 1497. Dalal assigns Bhadresvara to the reign of Karna (1064-94 A. D.), while Jacobi would identify this author, in all probability, with one Bhadreśvara in the 2nd half of the 12th century. of the Samvat era: in any way this work is to be put earlier than the Parisiṣṭaparvan of Hemacandra. It narrates the account of 63 Salakäpurușas and includes also the lives of eminent teachers from Kalaka down to Haribhadra. So far as this second section is concerned Hemacandra stops with Vajrasvamin while Bhadresvara's list comes upto Haribhadra. The collection of the materials', Jacobi remarks, 'for the whole history of the patriarchates was achieved, probably for the first time, by Bhadresvara' whose 'tales are, as a rule, but a more elegant version of the Kathānakas contained in the Curnis and Tikās'. Having noted some difference regarding
1 Published by Hiralal Hamsaraja, Jamnagar 1911; translated into German by Hertel, Münchon 1920; also see Winternitz HIL, II p. 545.
2 See Śri Rşimandala-prakaraṇam, Atmavallabha-granthamāla, No. 13, Valad 1939, especially its Introduction; Jaina Granthavali p. 175; Catalogue of Mss. in Jesalmere Bhandars p. 14, No. 126, Baroda 1923; Catalogue of Mss. at Pattan vol. I, p. 118; etc.