Yasastilaka and Indian Culture

Author(s): Krishnakant Handiqui
Publisher: Jain Sanskruti Samrakshak Sangh Solapur

Page 28

1. SOMADEYA. AND HIS AGE
Two important Jaina poets Vadirāja and Vādībhasimha are said to be Somadeva's disciples. Srutasāgara in his commentary on Yasastilaka 2. 126 quotes a statement which represents Somadeva as saying that both Vădirāja and Vādibhasimha are his disciples. The statement cannot, however, be traced in the two extant works of Somadeva, and neither Vadirāja nor Vadibhasimha claims Somadeva as his guru in any of their works. Vādirāja says at the end of his Pārsvanāthacarita, a poem in 12 cantos, that his guru is Matisāgara; besides, he belonged to the Nandisamgha, while Somadeva belonged to the Devasamgha. Similarly, Vādibhasimha in his prose romance Gadyacintāmani 1.6 gives expression to his deep obligations to his guru Puşpasena. On the other hand, it is not chronologically impossible for Vădirāja and Vādibhasimha to be regarded as disciples of Somadeva, Vădirāja, according to his own statement, wrote his Pārsvanāthacarita in Saka 947 (1025 A. D.) during the reign of the Western Calukya king Jayasimha II who ruled from 1015 to 1042 A. D. As regards Vādībhasimha, he as well as Vādirāja is mentioned in the Belgāmve grant of Jayasimha II, dated 1036 A. D., which describes a Saiva savant named Vādi-Rudraguņa as having defeated in argument Vādībhasimha, Vādirāja and other scholars; and the great king Rājarāja mentioned at the end of Vādībhasiṁha's poem Ksatracūdāmani' might very well refer to the Cola king Rājarāja the Great who ruled from 985 to 1014 A. D. It will be thus seen that Vădirāja and Vādibhasimha flourished in the first quarter of the eleventh century; and assuming Srutasāgara's statement to be correct and genuine, they may be regarded as having been Somadeva's disciples during their boyhood. But, nevertheless, it is strange that they should be so completely silent about their early guru Somadeva.
The epoch of Somadeva was preceded and followed by a considerable output of Jaina literature in various parts of India. Among his predecessors, from the beginning of the ninth century to the early part of the tenth, we find such names as Vīrasena (author of the Dhavală commentary and part of the Jayadhavala), Jinasena (completed the Jayadhavalā and wrote Adipurāna and other works), Guņabhadra (author of Uttarapurānce and Atmānusāsana), the Jaina Sākatāyana, Vidyānanda (author of Aộtasahasri, Tattvārthaslokavārtika etc.), Siddharşi (author of Upamitibhavaprapañcā kathā), and Harişeņa (author of Kathākosa) and others; while among his immediate successors, from about the last quarter of the tenth centary to the first quarter of the eleventh, we find Kanarese writers like Cāmunda
1 स वादिराजोऽपि श्रीसोमदेवाचार्यस्य शिष्यः। 'वादीभसिंहोऽपि मदीयशिष्याश्रीवादिराजोऽपि-मदीय शिष्यः' इत्युक्तत्वाच। 2 See below Chapter XIII. 3 heri Tarcisisei TFF TFT HET: 1 SAATTE : YTT fOrG: Il.