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Shri Mahavir Jain Aradhana Kendra
www.kobatirth.org
Acharya Shri Kailassagarsuri Gyanmandir
Additional Stanzas (Ms. C)
ENGLISH TRANSLATION
2. The Section on the Gāthās 15*1) The helpless gātha, composed with great labour (effort) by good poets, wails (weeps) placing both its :hands on xits (fore-) head, when the foolish reciter easily ruins (spoils) it (by his careless and faulty recitation).
16*1) The gâthā, is tortured (harassed) by bad reciters and bad writers who are ignorant of its (real) import, like a city when its sovereign rule is subverted.
16*2) Far better is even a single (charming) (beautiful) gāthā though composed (once) in a hundred years, but not even a crore of gāthās devoid of good qualities, though composed even within half a second.
18*I) Who is not ravished by the gathās? Who does not remember his dear friends ? Who (pray) is not tormented at the the sight of the jewel of a righteous person (i.e. a worthy, virtuous) person plunged in misery and suffering ?
3. The Section on Poetry 31*1) The plot of a poem, though rich in emotional appeal, produces delight only in the minds of very few people. Not all trees (but only a very few) blossom at the touch of the foot of a beautiful woman.
31*2) Our homage to the clever ones, the mighty elephants in the form of Prākrit poets (of olden times), whom even today the line of bees in the form of (modern) poets follows faithfully (closely), adhering to the path (trodden by them).
31*3) May Sanskrit poetry be burnt down (and go to ruin) and may also those who have composed it be burnt down (and go to ruin). When a house made of bamboo-reeds is on fire it produces a crackling sound.* * The sense of the second half of the gathā is obscuro.
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