Life of Hemchandracharya

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

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LIFE OF HEMACANDRA the said dactrine. But he advanced an excuse for the same by saying that it referred to a verse in the Mahābhārata where mention was made of hundred Bhişmas, three hundred Pāņdavas, thousand Droņas and numberless Karņas. Then he added that it might be quite possible that some of these many Pandavas were converted to the Jaina faith. Moreover, their statues could be seen in Satruñjaya, Nasik and Kedāra. A's the Brahmin did not know how to reply to such an argument, the king refused to take any proceedings against the Jainas.
The three other Prabandhas make no mention of this story. The same, however, appears in another version in the Kathākoşa. On the other hand, we find in Merutunga, in a somewhat diyergent form, a repetition of the third story of the Prabhāvakacaritra about the snubbing of the Purohita Āmiga by Hemacandra. Amiga censured that the Jaina ascetics received women into their monasteries and that they enjoyed too good meals. Such practices, he thought, easily led to violations of the vow of chastity. Thereupon Hemacandra silenced him with a simile that the moderation of the flesh-eating lion stands opposite to the erotic tendencies of the dove that lives on only feeble grains, and that proves the insignificance of the type of diet. Merutunga maintains that the incident took place during Kumārapāla's reign- and it is probable that Amiga served the latter. The fourth story in the Prabhāvakacaritra deals with the Bbāgavata-ascetic Devabodha who played a great rolé for some time in AŅhilvād and who behaved very arrogantly towards the king and the court-poet Śrīpāla, despite the fact that he was generously patronised by the king. Later on, he was suspected of holding drinking-bouts against the rules of his order. Although he managed to prevent any proof being found of his guilt, he was thenceforward neglected and driven to poverty. At last, he went to Hemacandra and composed a verse in his honour. Hemacandra had pity on him and obtained a lac for him from the king. With that money he paid his debts. Then he went to the bank of the Gangā and awaited his deliverance. This anecdote, too, is mentioned nowhere else. On the contrary, Devabodha is mentioned as an opponent of Hemacandra in Jinamaņdana's account of Kumārapāla's conversion, and it appears as if Rājasekhara (see Note 5) alluded to the latter story.44
The fifth and last story of the Prabhāvakacaritra deals with Hemacandra's experiences of the pilgrimage which has been already referred to and which Jayasimha made towards the end of his reign to Somanātha or Devapattana, the present-day Verāval in Sorath. Jayasimha was, so it is said, greatly purturbed because of his having no issue at all. He undertook therefore a pilgrimage on which Hemacandra accompanied him. First of all, they visited Satruñjaya where Jayasimba paid his homage to the first Tirthamkara and presented twelve villages to the shrine. From Satruñjaya he proceeded towards Samkali near Girnār and viewed therefrom the temple of Neminātha, which his officer Sajjana had ordered to be built out of the revenues of the province Saurāştra, without being authorised to do so. In order to secure the merit of having built the Temple for himself, Jayasimha freed the Governor from the repayment of the sum used, amounting to 27 lacs. Then he climbed the mountain Girnār and worshipped the Jina. Then he proceeded with Hemacandra to Someśvarapattana and paid homage to Siva