Chaupannamahapurischariyam

Author(s): Shilankacharya, Amrutlal Bhojak, Dalsukh Malvania, Vasudev S Agarwal
Publisher: Prakrit Text Society Ahmedabad

Page 22

-4)
INTRODUCTION
p. 119, note 2. See H. Lüders, Varuna, Gottingen 1951/59, p. 490, note 3.
p. 120, l. 20 f. ( transplantation of Mahāvīra's embryo). The traditional view that this episode was borrowed from the Brahmanical Kṛṣṇa-Balarama-legend has been called in question by W. Kirfel who reviewed SC/M in the Orientalistische Literaturzeitung 52 (1957), columns 262 ff. Kirfel's arguments are as follows:
(1) The earliest account of Kṛṣṇa's birth is found in the vamśānucarita-portion of the pañcalakṣaṇasection of the purāņas. Here it is only the latest version, i. e. that contained in the Viṣṇupurāṇa, which records the transplantation of Balarama's embryo (Viṣṇupurāņa IV 15). (2) The story of the transplantation of Mahavira's embryo is already represented on a relief of the 1st century A. D. at Mathura. Kirfel is of the opinion that the derivation of the Jain story from the Brahmanical story is in any case incompatible with the usual chronology of the puranas and of the Jain canon. But in order to settle the question it is important to know whether the dating of the Mathura relief can really be relied upon or not. In the second case, it might become necessary to reexamine our chronology, in the first case it would be better to derive the Brahmanical story from the Jain story and not the other way round (1. c. column 264).
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Kirfel's first argument must be accepted. However, a few details must be added to his representation of the facts. The tradition of the transplantation of Balarama's embryo has also entered into the vamśānucarita-portion of the Brahmaṇḍapurāna and Lingapurana. In the relevant passages Kṛṣṇa is called Devaki's eighth garbha which implies of course that Balarama was the seventh and that his embryo was transferred to Rohini. See Brahmaṇḍapurana II 71,228.232 and Lingapurāņa 69,57.61 (Kirfel in the Jacobi Felicitation Volume, Bonn 1926, pp. 307 f. and pp. 312 f.; Kirfel, Purāņa Pañcalakṣaṇa, Bonn 1927, pp. 475 f. ). But these references may be just as late or even later than the relevant text of the Viṣṇupurāna. Kirfel's second argument, however, does not bear scrutiny. The relief referred to cannot be taken as a representation of the transfer of M.'s embryo (J. Ph. Vogel, La sculpture de Mathurā, p. 52; see also V. S. Agrawala in the Journal of the U. P. Historical Society Vol. XX, Pts. I-II, pp. 68 ff. and ibid. Vol. for the year 1952, pp. 32 ff.; Jain Ant. 1937, pp. 75 ff. and 1944). But even then everbody would agree that the story which occurs for the first time in the Ayaranga is not later than the 1st century A. D.
Kirfel has not mentioned the fact that the transplantation is missing in the Digambara-version of the Mahavira-carita (Gunabhadra and Puspadanta) and in the Kṛṣṇa-epic of the Jains (Alsdorf, Harivaṁsapurāņa p. 49). A plain reference to the transplantation of Mahavira's embryo is missing in the Viyahapannatti (W. Schubring. Die Lehre der Jainas, Berlin und Leipzig 1935, p. 26), but all the other Svetambara-texts record the incident. According to one tradition, the embryos of Devanandă and Trisala are exchanged as in the Balarama-legend (Ajaranga, Jinacariya; HTr); other texts merely relate that Devananda's embryo is transferred to Trisala (Malabhasya 51 ff. of the Avasyaka-Niryukti; SC/E p. 270, 1. 10 ff. ).
Even though the transplantation is not recorded by the Digambaras, it is perfectly clear that the story occurs in Jain literature much earlier than in the puraņas. It was therefore wrong to derive the story from the Harivamsapurana of the Hindus (SC/M p. 120). On the other hand it is quite possible that the Jains took the story from other Brahmanical sources than the purāņas. According to Gunabhadra, Sită is Rāvana's daughter, and this feature was certainly borrowed from the Hindus, although the Brahmanical versions where it is found are all later than Gunabhadra's Uttarapurana (W. Stutterheim, Rama-Legenden and Rama-Reliefs in Indonesien, Munchen 1925, p. 107). This case, where a borrowing from the Jains is out of the question, clearly shows that the epics (and purāņas) had no monopoly