Jain Journal 1974 01

Author(s): Jain Bhawan Publication
Publisher: Jain Bhawan Publication

Page 29

JANUARY, 1974
had earned for himself and his country a place of distinction among international thinkers who had deified the position of the State.
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Two centuries later there appeared one of the greatest figures in the Indian literary world. This was Hemacandracarya, also called Hemacarya (A. D. 1089-1173). His royal patron was first the famous Siddharaja Jayasinhadeva (A. D. 1094-1143), the monarch of Gujarat and, then, the next ruler Kumarapaladeva (A. D. 1143-1174). In the days of king Siddharaja, Hemacandracarya had written a treatise on grammer called Siddhahema as well as other works like Abhidhänacintamani, Anekārthanāmamālā, Haimanāmamālā or a string of names composed by Hema (candra); and had begun his great Dvyasrayakāvya, which was intended to teach both grammer and the history of the Chaulukya or Solanki family to which king Siddharaja had belonged. But Hemacandracarya became more famous during the reign of the next monarch of Gujarat-Kumarapaladeva. Hemacandracarya's guru was the learned Bhattaraka, Devasuri, a Svetambara teacher.70
The life of Hemacandracarya is interwoven first with the career of Siddharajadeva and then of that of Kumarapaladeva." It abounds in wonders with which we are not concerned here. In the reign of Kumarapaladeva he wrote many well-known Sanskrit and Prakrit works like Adhyatmopaniṣad or Yogasastra in twelve chapters and 12,000 verses; Triṣaṣṭisalākāpuruşacaritra or the lives of sixtythree Jaina saints of the utsarpini and the avasarpini ages; the Parisiṣṭaparva of 3500 verses being the life of Jaina Sthaviras who had flourished after Mahavira; the Prakrit Sabdanusāsanam or Prakrit grammer ; Dvyasrayakavya, which he begun in the previous reign of king Siddharaja; and which was a double dictionary being both a grammar and history, the Chandanusasana of about 6,000 verses or prosody; the Lingānuśāsana on genders; the Desinamamala in Prakrit with a commentary, a work on local and provincial words; Alankaracūḍāmaṇi a work on rhetoric; and finally, Laghu-arhanniti with which we are concerned here.72
Along with the Laghu-Arhanniti we have to study Trişaşṭiśalākāpuruşacaritra, the first book of which styled Adisvaracaritra, is of much interest to us. The great Hemacandra harked back to Jinasenacarya
70 Indraji, Bhagawanlal, History of Gujarat (in the Bombay Gazetteers), pp. 156, 180, and ibid., note (2), 191, 192.
71 Indraji, ibid., p. 182ff.
72 Indraji, op. cit., p. 193. The Laghu-Arhanniti does not figure in this list. On Laghu-Arhanniti see Beni Prasad, op. cit., p. 227; Ghoshal, op. cit., pp. 456. 490.