Jain Journal 1996 04

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

Page 13

BANERJEE : ŞAȚKHAŅDĀGAMA AND ŚAURASENI
111
prescription of Sauraseni. This edition had some influence for a long time till the appearance of Manmohan Ghosh's edition in 1938 published by the University of Calcutta.
Ghosh, on the contrary, has given the features of Saurasenī both in verses and in prose passages. In his opinion, Rājasekhara must have written the Karpūramañjari in Sauraseni. As a result, he has corrected all the Māhārāstri features of the verses into Sauraseni, of course, in the support of new manuscript designated by him as A which he thinks is akin to Sten Konow's W. On the strength of these two supporting statements, Ghosh has edited the Karpūramañjari all through in Sauraseni. In this connection we may note that even though Ghosh has a bold step over Sten Konow to make his text full of Sauraseni, he could not maintain his gusto till the end. Almost in the 4th act and in part of the 3rd, he could not maintain the Sauraseni features even in the verses. Whether Ghosh's unique manuscript was mutilated at the end or whether the manuscirpt is incomplete for this incongruity, is not easy to ascertain at this moment, particularly when Ghosh himself is not explicit in this regard. Be that as it may, one main point of difference between the two may be that Sten Konow was perhaps goaded by the influence of Sanskrit dramaturgy which says that the songs in Prakrit should be in Mahārāstri, the idea which Sten Konow might have extended to the verses as well. Whatever may be the reason between the two, it is pretty certain that scholars who follow either edition will be guided by the reading of that edition, and therefore, there cannot be any reconciliation among the scholars. But one thing is sure that whether it is Māhārāstri or Sauraseni the characteristic features of both the languages are maintained throughout. There is no intermixture between Sauraseni and Māhāraştri in the same passage.
But the edition of Kundakunda who is supposed to have written in Sauraseni is not uniform as far as the editions are concerned. Both-dh- and -h-are found in any one of the editions of Kundakunda; and not only this, even in the same verse this dh- and -h- are interchanged, even though the manuscripts do not always support it. As a result, what happens scholars who are not familiar with the Prakrit grammars or even the linguistic principles maintain that both are found or possible in Saurasenī. The same confusion is also found in the Satkhandāgama. I do not know whether the manuscript contains this confusion or the editor himself is responsible for this confusion. In either case, in my opinion, it should be rectified or corrected in accordance with the rules of grammar or linguistics.