Jain Journal 1989 10

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

Page 29

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maturity of style and Caturmukha for the special metrical structure. Compared with Svayambhu, Puspadanta draws, more upon the subtelities of rhetoric, abundance of metrical varieties and the treasures of traditional learning. Greater prosodic variation and the longer kadavaka and sandhi indicate a further elaboration of sandhi-bandha as found with Pusapadanta.
JAIN JOURNAL
Some portions of the cantos 4,12,17,46,52 and a few others from the Mahāpurāṇa can be cited as the choicest flowers of Puspadanta's poetic genius. Cantos 69 to 79 recount in brief the Rāmāyaṇa, Cantos 81 to 92 narrate the Jaina Harivamsa while the end portion deals with the lives of Parsva and Mahavira, respectively the twenty-third and twenty-fourth Tirthankaras of the Jainas.
The Carita-Kavya
The other two poems of Puspadanta, viz., the Nayakumaracariya (Sk. Nāgakumāracarita) and the Jasaharacariya (Sk. Yasodharacarita) reveal that aside from the vast puranic themes the sandhi form was employed also for the biographical narratives of famous persons of Jaina mythology, legendary or traditional history. In its range and treatment the carita-kavya or kathā-kāvya reminds one of the Sanskrit sargabandha-kavya, though the Apabhramsa counterpart tends to have a shorter extent. In this case too Puspadanta had before him several earlier models. From a stray reference or two we know the names of at least two such poems-the Suddhayacariya of Svayambhu and the Pañcamicariya of his son, Tribhuvana.
The Nayakumaracariya narrates in nine cantos adventures of the hero Nagakumara (one of the twentyfour Kamadevas-Cupids' of the Jaina mythology) and his two powerful lieutenants, Vyala and Mahavyala with the object of illustrating the fruits of observing the fast on Sripañcami (the fifth of Phalguna).
Similarly the object of Puspadanta's third work, viz. Jasaharacariya (Sk. Yasodharacarita) is to illustrate the evil fruits of the sin of taking life through narrating in four cantos, the sotry of king Yasodhara of Ujjayini. Numerous works on these very subjects in Prakrit, Sanskrit, Apabhramsa and modern Indian languages before and after Puspadanta testify to the great popularity of the parva-kathās with the Jainas.
Puspadanta's mastery of the peotic craft, his matchless command of Apabhramsa language and his impressive erudition would entitle him