A History of Indian Literature v2.c19.s6.t3.92

v2.c19.s6.t3.92

Just as the Chinese ascribed one of Kumāralāta's works to Aśvaghoṣa, some poems by Mātṛceta have likewise been ascribed to Aśvaghoṣa in Tibet, and, according to the Tibetan historian Tāranātha, Mātṛceṭa is merely another name for Aśvaghoṣa.¹ It is probable that Mātṛceṭa was a somewhat senior contemporary of Aśvaghoṣa, and belonged to the same school of poets, and was therefore confused with him. King Kaniṣka at whose court it is generally assumed that Aśvaghoṣa lived, also invited the poet Mātṛceṭa to the court. Mātṛceṭa replied in a letter, called the Mahārāja Kanika-lekha,² which has come down in the Tibetan language; he asks the king to excuse him, as he is unable to come owing to his great age. The letter is a poem of 85 verses, containing chiefly admonitions to lead a moral life in the spirit of the Buddha. In verses running over with pity, the poet ends by imploring the king most earnestly to spare the creatures of the forest, and to give up the chase. When the Chinese pilgrim I-tsing (in the 7th century) was travelling in India, Mātṛceṭa was a very famous poet, and his hymns to Buddha were sung far and wide. The following legend, which I-tsing heard in India, testifies to his fame. Once when Buddha was walking through the forest, a nightingale began to sing sweet melodies, as though she were praising the glory of the Lord, whereupon the Buddha said to his disciples that this nightingale would once be reborn as Mātṛceṭa. His most famous hymns are the Catuḥ-Śataka Stotra, "the Hymn of Four Hundred Verses,” and the Śatapañcāśatika Stotra, “the Hymn of One Hundred and Fifty Verses.” Fragments of both of these have come down to us in Central Asian manuscripts.¹ They are poems in ślokas, in simple and unadorned, but beautiful, language, and they evidently impressed the faithful more by their pious thoughts than by their form. It is delightful, ays I-tsing, to hear his “Hymn of 150 Verses” or “Hymn of 400 Verses” recited in the assembly of monks. “These charming compositions,” he says further, “are equal in beauty to the heavenly flowers, and the high principles which they contain rival in dignity the lofty peaks of a mountain. Consequently in India all who compose hymns imitate his style, considering him the father of literature. Even men like the Bodhisattvas Asaṅga and Vasubandhu admired him greatly. Throughout India everyone who becomes a monk is taught Mātṛceta’s two hymns as soon as he can recite the five and ten precepts (Śīla). This course is adopted by both the Mahāyāna and the Hīnayāna schools.” I-tsing cannot find words sufficient to extol the merits of these poems, and he adds that there have been many commentators and imitators too. Thus the “Bodhisattva Jina” (an honourable title of the logician Dignāga) composed one verse to be placed before each of the one hundred and fifty verses of the Śatapañcāśatika Stotra, and in this way compiled a hymn of 300 verses, known as the “mixed Hymn of Praise.”² I-tsing himself translated the “Hymn of 150 Verses” into Chinese, and there are Tibetan translations of both hymns.¹ A few specimens from the Śatapañcāśatika Stotra will serve to give the reader an idea of this pious poetry: