Risht Samucchaya

Author(s): Durgadevacharya, A S Gopani
Publisher: Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan

Page 46

INTRODUCTION
the text freely in order to remove them. I have explained the reasons of my emendations and additions in the Notes wherever it was desireable. While rendering the stanzas into Sanskrit in the chāyā, I have kept the Sanskrit idioms, usages and conventions before my mind. English translation is strictly literal. Thus I 5 have tried my best to present a faithful record of the text-tradition from the three available Mss. and have exerted my utmost to do justice within the scope and limitations of the material.
3. Durgadeva and His Works Wo know practically nothing about Durgadeva and his works. No epigraphic and literary references throw any light 10 on this hitherto unknown writer. Under these circumstances we have merely to rely on the internal evidences and on what has been said by the author himself in this compendium.
(i) DurgadEVA: Three names having Durga as the first counterpart are known in Jaina literature. In the CC there is 15 a reference to the Şaştisamvatsara composed by one Durgadeva. This very book has also been alluded to by Mm. Meghavijaya in his Varşaprabodha' which describes it to have been written in the form of a dialogue between Pārtha and Durgamuni. After a careful perusal it can be definitely said that this Durgamuni is zo not our Durgadeva who is the author of the RS. In the AS, we come across a referece to Durgasimha who is also found different from our author. Mr. Desar in his book mentions one Durgasvāmi as a pupil of Dellamahattara and a guru of Siddharşi, the famous writer of the UBPK. This also cannot be identified with our 25 author. In the BȚ,4 there is a very reliable reference to the Kālajñāna, Arghakūnda and Mantramahodadhi as the works of Digambara Durgadeva. The above-mentioned Kalajñūna is nothing else but the RS. These details obtained from the B? regarding Durgadeva and his two more works are quite convin-30 cing. It settles two facts, namely, Durgadeva was a Digambara Jaina and he had written, besides the RS, two more works
1 p. 680. 2 Trans. Popatlal Sakarchand Shah, Kikabhat's Pole, Ahmedabad, 1939. 3 JSSI, para 248.
4 JSS, Vol. 1, No. 4; p. 157. Note that the B?, CC and JG refer to it as the Kālajñana while the printed catalogue of the Mss. of BORI refers to it as the Ristaxamuccaya.
5 See footnoto 1 on page 1 and 1 on page 2 of the Intro.