Nirgrantha-1

Author(s): M A Dhaky, Jitendra B Shah
Publisher: Shardaben Chimanbhai Educational Research Centre

Page 23

K. R. Chandra
Nirgrantha
3. A high percentage of retention and very low percentage of dropping of medial consonants in the MS-J is questionable in view of the evolution of MIA language and the nature of the Mahārāstri Prakrit in the 6th century A. D., the date of the composition of the VHBh can be assumed between A. D. 580-585. If the author made use of large the number of Sanskrit equivalents (tatsama words), it seems to be the consequence of the influence of Sanskrit during its golden age. In the MS-J., medial dental -t is often retained in the words, namely ablative singular suffix -to, verbal termination -ti of the present tense of III singular, and in the past participle -ta. Out of 198 instances, -t-is voiced on a single occasion e. g. disadi for Sanskrit drsyate (verse No. 53) and it is dropped 13 times only whereas retained 184 times. In the MS-T the dropping is 15% and the retention 70%. When we compare these two MSS. with the two editions H and K., the dropping of medial consonants rise up to 48% and the retention goes down to 43%. The percentage of voicing goes on decreasing with the passage of time (i.e. with the later dates of MSS.) e. g. 18.5% in J, 14% in T, and 9% in H as well as in K. This fact makes it abundantly clear that the copyists and the reciter-teacher-monks (preachers) brought about this kind of modification either inadvertantly or intentionally on account of the influence of the Prakrit language of their own times and also under the sway of the Prakrit grammar of very late dates.
If this was the condition of the original language of the text of VABh, within a few centuries after its composition, then what would be the state of the original Ardhamāgadhi language of the Jaina āgama texts in their MSS. copied a thousand or 1500 years late. We are now becoming increasingly aware that there has been a continual change in the language of a text in Prakrit MSS. which were copied in different periods by different copyists in western India.
4. Position of the Language of Inscriptions :
A study of the phonological changes in the language of inscriptions reveals that the dropping of medial consonants goes on advancing with the passage of time. This tendency of dropping has travelled from the North-West and North to other regions of India. The use of -n- (cerebral nasal) for -n- (dental nasal) has been a trait of the Northwest, North, and South. One of the oldest available Prakrit inscription, now regarded of c. 200 from Barli?, there is no dropping of medial consonant (e. g. there is no -e in place of -te and -ye, the inflectional suffixes.)
In the Aśokan inscriptions, the average phonological changes is only 1 1/2 to 3% only. In the inscription of king Khäravela (c. B. C. 50-25), the voicing of medial consonants advances (i. e. 6 out of 8 instances are voiced). There -th- becomes -dh-, and the phonological changes on the whole are 5 to 6%. It is in the inscriptions of Pañjatār, Kalwān and Taksasilā (of the 1st century A. D.), located in the North-West, that the
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