Morphological Evidence For Dialectal Variety In Jaina Maharastri

Author(s): Nalini Balbir
Publisher: Nalini Balbir

Page 19

JAINA MĀHĀRĀȘTRĪ
521
it 105. Both -e nominative endings, preservation of l-s, and s-s show that the dialect is authentic AMg.
Nevertheless a look at the main variants testifies to a tendency towards normalization : the Avaśyaka-editions have nagarim, the Kathākośa has rāyā; the verb lamehii, lamissae (Sk. RAM), which seems to be the original reading, appears not to have been understood any more and is replaced by loose equivalents : LAG, LABH, or GAM in its technical meaning "to have sexual intercourse with ". Nor are we surprised to see that in the Kathākośa, a Sanskrit work interspersed with Middle-Indian quotations, the rhythm of the vaitālīya has been altered.
On the other hand, we have two curious instances of what might be called hypercorrection. Throughout the tradition, the ascetic's name appears as Kūlavālaka, in the AMg stanzas as well as in the prose accounts. The Avaśyaka-cūrņi, however, distinguishes between verse and prose and hands down a westernized form of the name in the surrounding prose, viz. Kūlavāraka. . I find the second detail more puzzling : in Hemacandra's Trișașțišalākāpuruşacaritra which also includes the same story, our stanza is in the shape of a Māgadhi śloka characterized by the l (lamija) and the palatal sibilant, thus śamane 106, Veśālim, but gahissadi 107.
guniyam ce Māgadhiyam śamane Kulavālake lamijja Kūnie lāyā to Veśālim gahissadi (10.12.316) 108
My second group of AMg vaitālīyas occurs in a dogmatical context in the Bșhatkalpabhāsya. These five verses (1 + 2 + 2, scil. 4325, 4330-31, 4362-63) are milestones in a section otherwise composed of ordinary āryās (BK Bh 4308-4366) and devoted to the discussion of a question which was undoubtedly of great importance for the Svetāmbara Jainas: the distribution of clothes (paribhāyane BK Bh 4308) among nigganthas and nigganthis.
105. Cp. H. JACOBI, Buddhas und Mahāvīras Nirvāna und die politische Entwicklung Magadhas zu jener Zeit, “Sitzungsberichte der Preussischen Akad. d. Wissenschaften...", 1930, p. 567 = Kleine Schriften, vol. II, p. 813.
106. As expected : see Pi § 202, Māgadhi śāvaka = Sk. śrävaka, etc.
107. We expect -ŚĆ: see Pi § 520. Is this inconsistency due to an error? However, cp. Gāndhārī Dharmapada where the phonetic development of -sy- is different in a future (bhavisadi) and elsewhere (manusa): J. BROUGH, The Gāndhāri Dharmapada. London, 1962, $ 59.
108. This is the text as improved with the help of the aforesaid parallel versions. Both the Bhavnagar edition of Vikrama samvat 1965 and the Sanskrit chāyā available in H. M. JOHNSON, Trisastiśalākāpuruşacaritra or the Lives of Sixty-Three Mustrious Persons... Translated into English, vol. VI. Baroda, 1962 (G.O.S. 140), p. 326, n. 249 (with the correction of p. 379) are unsatisfactory.