Life of Hemchandracharya

Author(s): Manilal Patel
Publisher: Singhi Jain Shastra Shiksha Pith Mumbai

Page 16

FOREWORD
Kalikālasarvajña, "The Omniscient of the Kali Age", was the title given to the great Jaina monk Hemacandra by his co-religionists, and he well deserved this title and his fame, on account of the astounding many-sidedness of his literary achievements. He was indeed one of the most versatile and prolific writers, both as a poet and as a scholar. It is due to him that Gujarat became a main stronghold of the Svetāmbara Jainas and has remained so for centuries, and that Jaina literature flourished there particularly in the 12th and 13th centuries. By his influence on the two Caulukya kings Jayasimha Siddharāja, and Kumārapāla he was able to direct, in some measure, the destinies and the cultural progress of his native country. But not only Gujarat and tho Jaina community owe a great debt of gratitude to Hemacandra, he has also a place of honour in general Sanskrit literature as a compiler of useful and important works on grammar, lexicography, poctics and metrics.
Among his poetical works his huge epic on the Lives of the Sixty-three Excellent Men" (Trişasti-Salākāpuruşa-Carita) is perhaps best known. Though not without merit as a work of poetry, a Mahākāvya, as it is described by the author himself, yet its main purpose is instruction and edification. For us it is invaluable as a storehouse of ancient legendary lore and tradition. The appendix to this work, the Paris'istaParvan, also called "Lives of the Series of Elders" (Sthavirävali-Carita) is even more important by its wealth of folklore and stories of all kinds. He has preserved to us many popular proverbs, and in one of his stories even folk-songs in dialect.
As a devout Jaina he also composed some hymns of praise (Stotras). His "Hymn to the Passionless (Mahāvīra)”, the Vitarāgastotra, is at the same time a poetical manual of the Jaina religion.
Hemacandra is always more of a scholar and a moralist than a poet, though not without taste and considerable skill in the use of the Kāvya style. This is also shown by his didactic poem, the Yogas'āstra, consisting of a text in simple ślokas and a commentary in the style of ornate poetry, containing also stories.
As a poet, as a historian in some way, and as a grammarian, all at the same time, Hemacandra proved himself in the one epic poem Kumārapāla-Carita, also known as Dvyūs'raya-Kārya, because it is written in two languages, Sanskrit and Prakrit. The