A History of Indian Literature v2.c20.s3.46

v2.c20.s3.46

For instance the Jainas incorporated the Kṛṣṇa-cult into their religion at a very early period, and consequently also interwove the Kṛṣṇa-legend with their own treasury of legends. As early as in the eighth Aṅga we met with a Jinistic form of the legend of the destruction of the city of Dvāravatī and the death of Kṛṣṇa. This is told in greater detail in Devendra's commentary on the Uttarajjhayaṇa.¹ It is in the same commentary that we find the ancient legend of the descent of Gaṅgā and the destruction of the sixty thousand sons of Sagara,² which is familiar to us from the epics. The great attractiveness of this epic legend for the Jaina narrator lay in the fact that the death of the sons was such a convenient peg on which to hang consolatory speeches, with pious thoughts as to the transitoriness of all earthly things. Moreover, their death is justified by Karman in the Jinistic sense. This is also used as an opportunity to introduce a Consolatory Story, which is but a variant of the Buddhist legend of Kisā-Gotamī and the mustard-seed.³ The Pacceka-Buddha stories, which Devendra tells as a connected whole in his commentary, show points of contact with Buddhist literature. In the story of the fourth of these royal saints, namely King Naggai, the story of Kaṇayamañjarī is inserted, who has been regarded as the prototype of Sheherezade.¹ One of the most charming romances which Devendra has preserved for posterity, is that of Mūladeva, the Jack of all trades, and the courtesan Devadattā.² Connected with Mūladeva, who, by the way, seems really to have lived and to have been the author of a Kāma-Śāstra,³ there is also the interesting robber tale of Maṇḍiya, who excites the pity of the people as a beggar by day, whilst he reduces the city to a state of terror as a murderous robber and burglar by night. Another robber tale is the prose narrative of Agaladatta, of which, however, a far more beautiful, and undoubtedly earlier poetic setting has come down to us in Devendra's commentary.⁴