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280
THE INDIAN ANTIQUARY.
(JULY, 1891.
this inscription to the same Piyadasi as he who was the author of all the others; and it is useless to go again over the considerations which he has so well put forward. I have in the examination just concluded, indicated a new reason, drawn from chronological considerations, which could not have struck Dr. Bühler, because it depended on an interpretation altogether different from that which he has proposed. I must here repeat and complete my demonstration, and this will be an opportunity for passing in review the dates, unhappily too rare, which the king furnishes for certain events of his reign.
According to the 13th Edict, the conversion of Piyadagi should date from the ninth year after his coronation. It was immediately after the conquest of Kalinga that there awoke in him, under the direct impression of war and its horrors, the intense desire for the dhanma. With this it is important to connect a piece of evidence in the 8th Edict, of which every one, myself as well as other interpreters, has hitherto misunderstood the bearing.
Since my commentary appeared, this passage has been the subject of two revisions, one by Pandit Bhagwânlal Indrajis and the other by Dr, Bühler. The important sentence is the third. It runs as follows at Girnar: 60 dévánaripriyo priyadasi roja dasavasábhisitó saihto ayáya sabodhi. The text is practically the same in the other versions, the only difference consisting in the substitution of nikhami (or nikhamithd) for the verb ay dya. The construction and translation of the Pandit cannot be sustained, but Dr. Bühler has made some very just objections against my interpretation, although in his turn he has missed the translation which I now consider to be the true one. It is impossible to credit Piyadasi (as I have indeed always carefully abstained from doing) with pretending to have attained to the Perfect Intelligence, and it would be hazardous to admit that a term so important as sambidhi could have been used, at the date of Piyadasi, in a sense so widely different from its technical employment, which is testified to by the whole range of Buddhist literature. It is also certain that the phrase sanbodhin nishkrántur could hardly be rendered as meaning 'to attain to the Intelligence.' I translate it, therefore, exactly as suggested by Dr. Bühler himself '(der König) zog auf die rabodhi aus,' - '(the king) put himself on the way, set out for the sarnbodhi.' But we must adhere to this translation, and not substitute for it, as my learned critic does immediately afterwards, another interpretation which spoils the sense, he put himself on the way, with a view to, on account of, the sarabodhi.' We recognize here a simple variation of an expression familiar to Buddhist phraseology, saibódhiri prastha tu, 'to set out for the Perfect Intelligence put oneself on the way for the bôdhi.' As is proved by the passages of the Lotus, the expression is commonly applied to men who, tearing themselves from lukewarmness and indifference, engage seriously in the practices of a religious life, or, as we should say, of devotion, the final aim of which is, in the eyes of every orthodox Buddhist, the conquest of the Perfect Intelligence. It is to this idiom that the king here refers ; he himself applies it to himself; and, if he has slightly modified it, it is to render more obvious the double meaning which he bad in view. He wishes to connect more clearly this ideal march towards perfection with the tours and excursions of former kings, by means of the very real tours and excursions to which he had been inspired by his religions zeal. It is, therefore, to his conversion that Piyadasi here alludes, and thus the fact is explained that he can give a positive date to 'tours' which he would often have to repeat.
I have only to make reservations concerning some of the details where my interpretation differs from that of my learned predecessor. For instance, the word ahala, which means simply, as I believe I have shown, nourishment, alimentation, cannot be quoted to establish the Buddhist inspiration of the passage, although that inspiration is incontertable and proved by more solid arguments. I do not now speak of the chronological question, with which I shall shortly deal.
5). R. 4. 8., Bo. Br., XV. pp. 982 and A.
I now believe that this is certainly the correct reading, and that the anusuára is only imaginary. This idea of reading aylya, which agreed badly with the nikhami of the other texts, contributed not a little to lead me astray at first as to the true sense of the passage.
1 Burnouf, Lotus de la Bonne Loi, pp. 316 and ff.
