Jain Journal 2000 04

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

Page 36

JAIN JOURNAL: Vol-XXXIV, No. 4 April 2000 significant Mahā-kāvya which has been the source for all Kannada Jaina Purāņas. Ātmānu-śāsana is another philoshophical work of Acārya Gunabhadra, who was also a preceptor to Kṛṣṇa-II, son of Amōghavarsa. Jinasena's greatest gifts were poetry and commentary in both of which he displayed uch remarkable sensibility that makes it difficult to judge in which he excelled better. Adipurāņa is relevant to contemporary times, steeped in material acquisitions and blind to the voice of the spirit.
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The period of Amōghavarsa is considered as the Augustan age of Jaina literature. Mahavirācārya, a skilled mathematician and courtpoet, states in his Ganita-sara-samgraha that the subjects under the rule of Amōghavarṣa were happy and the land yielded plenty of grain, 'may the kingdom of Amoghavarṣa, the follower of Jainism', ever increase far and wide.
Grammarian Palyakirti Sākaṭāyana, also a court poet of Amōghavarṣa, wrote his famous grammar Sākaṭāyana along with auto commentary Amogha-Vṛtti, named after the monarch. This work is a vivid example of the Jaina school of grammar.
Śrīvijaya was another Jaina author and poet-laureate in the court of Amōghavarṣa. He wrote kavirāja mārga, a treatise on Indian poetics, at the instance of his master. Śrīvijaya heralded a new era of practically opening the flood gate for a rich harvest of Kannada literature in all genre. In the context of Karnataka, Kavirājamārga, poet's avenue, was the first grammar, first treatise on poetics and prosody, first work to speak of Karnataka's boundary, people and the dialects of Kannada language, and it has some other firsts to its credit.
Śrīvijaya also wrote Candraprabhapurāṇa and Raghuvamsapurāṇa based on the material from Kaviparameṣṭhi's Vagartha Samgraha (C. 8th cent. A.D.), a biography in Sanskrit of 63 great men of Jaina mythology. Śrīvijaya, a trend setter, was the earliest to depart from the traditional tract of writing commentaries as his predecessors did. He preferred to deviate and compose creative works of eminence. Candraprabhapurāṇa, on the life of Candraprabha, the eighth Tirthankara, is the first Jaina purāņa in Kannada language. Similarly Raghuvamsa purana is the earliest poem in Kannada on the theme of the Rāmāyaṇa. Probably, Śrīvijaya has identified Amoghavarṣa with Rama, and Raghuvamsa with Rāṣṭrakūta dynasty. The verses on the theme of the Rāmāyaṇa quoted in Kavirajamārga are evidently from this work.
Poet Asaga (C. 9th cent. A.D.), another noted Jaina genius during