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A History of Sanskrit Literature c17.s2: 2. Didactic Poetry

A History of Sanskrit Literature c17.s2

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English

2. Didactic Poetry

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There is, of course, no clear line of demarcation between gnomic and didactic verse; the easiest mode of distinction rests on the extent and degree of unity of conception, and that permits of indefinite variety. Of early work of the pronounced didactic type very little has come down to us; Çāntideva's *Bodhicaryāvatāra* is the most distinguished effort known to us to adapt the elegances of Sanskrit poetry to the exposition of a complex philosophical and moral theme. Some of the poems ascribed to Çaṅkara may be reckoned as sufficiently elaborate to be styled didactic tracts, for example, the *Çataçlokī*¹ which in 101 Sragdharā verses sets out with some wealth of imagery the principles of the Vedānta; the *Mohamudgara*,² on the other hand, by the fire of its manner and the elaborate riming it affects is more lyric than didactic; much of it features as the *Dvādaçapañjarikāstotra*. Some poetic merit attaches to the *Çr̥ṅgārajñānanirṇaya*,³ which in a form not common in Sanskrit gives a contest between the claims of love and of knowledge in thirty-two stanzas, the claims of love being espoused by Rambhā, those of philosophy by Çuka. The author and date are alike unknown, but the latter is hardly early.

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¹ Ed. *Select Works of Srisankaracharya*, pp. 85 ff.

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² Ed. Haeberlin, 265 ff.

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³ Ed. J. M. Grandjean, AMG. x. 477 ff.

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A more interesting and quite definitely datable work is the early treatise on Indian pornography, the *Kuṭṭanīmata*,⁴ advice of a hetaira, of Dāmodaragupta, minister of Jayāpīḍa of Kashmir (779–813). The book shows a young girl how to win gold for herself by the use of all the arts of flattery and feigned love, while preserving throughout a mere desire for wealth. Kalhaṇa mentions him as a poet, and Mammaṭa and Ruyyaka cite verses from him, as do the anthologies, showing that his work won considerable fame. From the point of view of literary history, it has the interest that it depicts a representation of Harṣa's *Ratnāvalī* in an effective and realistic manner. The author's style is simple but not inelegant; it begins:

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⁴ Ed. KM. iii. 32 ff.; J. J. Meyer, *Altind. Schelmenbücher*, ii (1903).

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*sa jayati saṁkalpabhavo Ratimukhaçatapatracumbanabhramaraḥ*
*yasyānuraktalalanānayanāntavilokitaṁ vasatiḥ.*

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‘Victorious is he, the mind-born god, the bee who kisses the hundred petals of Rati's face, whose abode is the glance shot from the corner of the eye of amorous maidens.’ There is both wit and humour, despite their coarseness, in some of his stanzas:

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*çṛṇu sakhi kautukam ekaṁ grāmyeṇa kukāminā yad adya kṛtam*
*suratasukhamīlitākṣī mṛteti bhītena muktāsmi.*

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‘Let me tell you, friend, of a singular thing a boorish fellow of a lover did to me to-day; I had closed my eyes in the ecstacy of the moment, when thinking me dead he took fright and let go of me.’

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*avidagdhaḥ çramakaṭhino durlabhayoṣid yuvā vipraḥ*
*apamṛtyur apakrāntaḥ kāmivyājena me rātrau.*

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‘Death untimely, in the shape of an uncultivated fellow, rough with his work, who can't easily get women for all his youth, a Brahmin at that, departed from me at night in the guise of a lover.’

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*paryaṅkaḥ svāstaraṇaḥ patir anukūlo manoharaṁ sadanam*
*nārhati lakṣāṁçam api tvaritakṣaṇacauryasuratasya.*

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‘A couch with a fair coverlet, a loving spouse, a pleasant seat, all these are not worth a ten-thousandth part of the secret union which takes place in a hurried moment.’ With modern examples before us, it is not surprising to find that Dāmodaragupta has lavished on this work the resources acquired by a prolonged study of the *Kāmasūtra*, the text-books on poetics, and the lexicons.

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Doubtless inspired in some degree by his predecessor, Kṣemendra, the polymath of Kashmir, wrote his *Samayamātṛkā*,¹ which perhaps means ‘mother by convention’, alluding to the fact that the hetaira-to-be is introduced by a barber as the regular go-between to an ancient expert, Kalāvatī, to be instructed in her exacting profession. The old lady, though owl-faced, crow-necked, and cat-eyed, through the passage of time since she was an expert, proves a witty instructress, and with her skilled aid the young aspirant ends by cheating a young fool and his stupid parent. Another of Kṣemendra’s numerous writings is the *Kalāvilāsa*² which in ten sections discourses of the various occupations and follies of mankind. The hero of the book is the famous Mūladeva,³ the personification of all trickery, who consents to educate in his own trade the young Candragupta whom his father entrusts to his care. We learn from him of the great spirit of cheating, Dambha, which has descended to earth and reigns among ascetics, doctors, lackeys, singers, goldsmiths, merchants, actors, and indeed all others; it has spread even to the world of beasts—witness the crane who parades himself as a penitent to snare the unwary fish, and is known even in the vegetable world—the trees wear bark garments just like ascetics. There is in certain respects a curious modernity in Kṣemendra’s pictures; he knew wandering singers and bards who went about, gipsy-like, with pots and carts, wearing their hair long, rich in children, winning many gifts by flattery and wasting by mid-day what they had received in the morning. More medieval is the complaint made of the goldsmith with his tricks to cheat those who put work in his hands. But we are back to modernity when we find that the doctor, who has quack medicines and who has killed many a patient, is at last voted a great success and cuts a splendid figure; that the astrologer, with all his hocus-pocus and his readiness to predict what his clients wish to hear, does not even know what his wife is doing behind his back; and that the seller of patent remedies, whose head is as bald as a copper kettle, is yet prepared to guarantee an infallible cure for baldness and finds purchasers. The *Darpadalana*,⁴ in seven sections, is intended to show the folly of pride whether it be based on noble birth, wealth, knowledge, beauty, courage, generosity, or asceticism. The form is not uninteresting; each section begins with some gnomic sentences, and then follows a tale in which the leading character delivers himself of a long speech which in effect is a continuation of the maxims. The Buddha appears in this role in ii, Çiva in vii, where he denounces some ascetics as not worth saving, since their passions cling to them still. The *Sevyasevakopadeça*¹ in sixty-one stanzas is a little text of advice regarding servants and their masters, the *Caturvargasaṁgraha* describes the four ends of life, morality, practical life, love, and release, characteristically with more effort in the case of love than in those of the others. The *Cārucāryāçataka*² is a century of verses laying down the rules of good behaviour, illustrating them by references to myths and tales. The work has a certain interest, because it was used by and doubtless influenced the writing of the *Nītimañjarī*³ of Dyā Dviveda (1494), which illustrates some 200 verses of maxims by tales culled from Sāyaṇa’s commentary on the *Ṛgveda*. Probably due to Kṣemendra’s influence is also the *Mugdhopadeça*⁴ of Jalhaṇa, a warning in sixty-six stanzas against the wiles of hetairai.

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¹ Ed. KM. 10, 1888.

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² Ed. KM. i. 34 ff. Cf. WZKM. xxviii. 406 ff.

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³ Bloomfield, PAPS. lii. no. 212; Pavolini, GSAI. ix. 175.

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⁴ Ed. KM. vi. 66 ff.; trs. ZDMG. lxix. 1 ff.

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¹ Ed. KM. ii. 79 ff.

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² Ed. KM. ii. 128 ff.

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³ Keith, JRAS. 1900, pp. 127 ff., 796 f.

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⁴ Ed. KM. viii. 125 ff.

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Kṣemendra can write a fairly simple style, which appears to the best advantage in his reflections on the world and on morals, nor must we for a moment suggest that his remarks on erotics are of the character of pornography; he unquestionably had throughout his work a moral aim, however little we may care for his mode of treating difficult issues. Some of the *Kalāvilāsa* stanzas are quite pretty:

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*atha pathikavadhūdahanaḥ çanakair udabhūn nṛcākaralokaḥ*
*kumudaprabodhadūto vyasanaguruc̣ cakravākīnām.*

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‘Then slow uprose the shimmering moon, tormenting the wives of those afar, portending the awakening of the night-lotuses, and causing the female Cakravāka birds the grief of loss of their spouses.’

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*anāṅgenābalāsaṅgāj jitā yena jagattrayī*
*sa citracaritaḥ kāmaḥ sarvakāmaprado ’stu vaḥ.*

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'May Love who, though bodiless, with women only to aid him conquered the three worlds, bestow on you, wonder-worker, all that you love.'

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*artho nāma janānāṁ jīvitam akhilaḥ kriyākalāpaç ca*
*taṁ ca haranty atidhūrtāç chagalagalā gāyanā loke.*
*tamasi varākaç cauro hāhākāreṇa yāti saṁtrastaḥ*
*gāyanacauraḥ kapaṭī hāhā kṛtvā nayati lakṣam.*

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'Gold is the life and all the business of life for men, yet in this world our singers with their goat-like bleats are clever enough to steal it away; when the wretched thief in the night hears the shout "Oh, Oh," he takes to his heels in panic, but the cunning thief of a singer gets a lakh of coins when his audience shouts "Oh, Oh".' The term *hāhā* expresses joy as well as fright. The denunciation of the goldsmith is quite effective:

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*Meruḥ sthito 'tidūre manuṣyabhūmiṁ parityajya*
*bhīto bhayena cauryāc caurāṇāṁ hemakārāṇām.*
*tasmān mahīpatīnām asambhave cauradasyūnām*
*ekaḥ suvarṇakāro nigrāhyaḥ sarvathā nityam.*

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'Why does mount Meru keep so far away from our earth? It is in fear of being stolen by our thieves of goldsmiths. Therefore kings, when robbers and thieves are scarce, should suppress by all means in their power the goldsmith.'

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Half a century younger than Kṣemendra was Amitagati whose *Subhāṣitaratnasaṁdoha*, 'Collection of Jewels of Happy Sayings,'¹ was written in 994 and his *Dharmaparīkṣā* twenty years later.² The former work in thirty-two chapters, usually written in one and the same metre, touches on the various aspects of Jain ethics, with an obvious polemical attitude towards Brahmanical speculations and practice. As usual, women are assailed readily (vi), and hetairai have a whole chapter to themselves (xxiv). The Āptas, the perfect men of Jainism, are described in xxviii, and the Brahmanical gods are denied the right to rank with them because they lust after women, indulge in drink, and are devoted to the world of sense. The assault on Brahmanism is resumed with much legendary matter to support it in the later work. More important is Hemacandra's *Yogaçāstra*,¹ written in simple Çlokas, with his own commentary in somewhat elaborate prose. The first four chapters contain as developed in the commentary a full and clear account of Jain philosophy, the last eight deal with the various duties and ascetic practices of Jainism. There is, as in Amitagati, the constant glorification of Ahiṅsā and depreciation of women, and, though Hemacandra is capable of some moderately good poetry it would be absurd to give the work any high literary rank. From this point of view greater value attaches to the little but elaborate *Çṛṅgāravairāgyataraṅgiṇī*² in forty-six stanzas, denouncing the love of women, by Somaprabha (1276).

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¹ Ed. KM. 82; with trans. R. Schmidt and J. Hertel, ZDMG. lix. and lxi; cf. WZKM. xvii. 105 ff.

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² N. Mironow, *Die Dharmaparīkṣā des Amitagati* (1903).

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¹ Ed. BI. 1907 ff. ; i-iv, ZDMG. xxviii. 185 ff.

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² Ed. KM. v. 124 ff.

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