On the Buddhacarita of Asvaghosa

·期刊原文
On the Buddhacarita of Asvaghosa

Sen, Sukumar
Indian Historical Quarterly
2:3
1926.09
pp.657--662

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p.657

The 'Buddhacarita,' as edited by E. B. Cowell (in
the Anecdota Oxoniensia series) , is a very
interesting work, forming the earliest extant
specimen of artificial epic poetry (kavya) in
Sanskrit. In this brief note I shall discuss the
language of the published text, which far from being
complete and is overstrewn with early interpolations
and scribal errors as well as emendations. I must add
here that I have not here considered the last four
spurious cantos. The eleven slokas in Canto 9 which
do not occur in Cowell's text but which were
recovered by Mm. Haraprasad Sastri (JASB., 1909) have
not been utilised in this paper, although they are
genuine.

There are only three notable Prakritisms: khela
(), 2. 31 and 7. 36; abhasura (), 12.53; and
vanka (), 11. 46.
Two wrong sandhis occur: ubhe 'pi (for ubhe api),
9. 21;and saujasvi (for sa ojasvi), 8. 3. There is
also a shortening of quantity of the long vowel a for
metrical purpose: gato 'ryaputrah (for gata aryaputrah),
8. 34.

Anomalous nominal forms are very few: loka has
once been used as neuter, e. g. lokani hi trini, 'the
three worlds,' 10. 81; anjana for anjana 'collyrium,'
8. 21; sahiya for sahiyasi? 10. 26; vasthanam for
avasthanam, 4. 55; dharman for dharma, 5. 77, 11. 20.
Once the verb in plural has been construed with the
nominative in singular (this is no doubt scribe's
blunder): nrpo'pi ca prapur imam girim vrajan 'the
king too, walking, reached the hill,' 11. 73.

A remarkable feature is the abundant use of the
cognate accusative, especially with verbs meaning
'to speak'. Thus, puspadrumah svam kusumam puphulluh
'the flowering trees put on their blossoms,' 1. 44;
tapamsy atapta (practised penances,' 2, 49; vacamsy
uvaca 'spoke words,' 1. 59; vakyam abravit 'spoke the
word,' 4. 3; vacanam cedam uvaca 'spoke this
speech', 5. 29; bruvan vakyam idam tasthau 'stood
speaking this speech', 6. 13; giram ity uvaca 'this
speech he uttered', 7. 37, etc.; abravid vacah, 9. 62
; vaco babhase, 13. 3; nanada simha-nadam 'roared
the lion's roar', 5. 84.

The preposition prati, in various senses, governs
the accusative; 1. 73 (twice); 1. 81; 2. 57; 4. 24;
6. 43; 7. 12, 45; 8. 54; 9. 14, 67; 11. 50, 62; 13.
16. The accusative is also governed by

p.658

desiderative adjectives, but the genitive occurs
with didrksa, e.g. didrksaya sakyakuladhvajasya 'for
the desire of seeing the banner of the race of the
Sakyas', 1. 63; etc. In the compound
vanabhumididrksaya 'for the desire of seeing the
forest tract', 5. 2, however, it governs the
accusative. The accusative has also been used with
the compound vibhi: sukham vibhir mam apahaya 'afraid
of pleasure, (and) leaving me', 8. 64. Peculiar is
the accusative in: dharmanadim pasyati jivalokah.
'living beings would drink of the river of dharma',
1, 76. The instrumental with the compound vinakrta
'separated' occurs frequently: 8. 21, 37, 78, etc.;
also the instrumental is construed with the
conjunctives and derivatives of vi-yui; e.g.
viyujyamane' pi tarau puspair api phalair api (in the
tree, also, when divorced from flowers and from
fruits', 4. 61. In the following instance the instru-
mental has been used absolutely:
sarira-cittavyasana-tapais tair evamvidhais tais ca
nipatyamanaih / naivasanac chakya-munis cacala svam
niscayam bandhum ivopaguhya 'inspite of those
penances of body and mind, and heat, and inspite of
these thus assailing him, the Sakya sage did not move
from his seat, hugging his own resolve, as it were a
friend', 13. 43.

The dative is regularly construed with verbs
meaning 'to tell, to send, to show' etc., but in a
few instances the dative has been replaced by the
genitive; e. g. tato' bravit sarathir asya 'then the
charioteer spoke to him', 3. 42; babhramur
darsayantyo'sya sronih 'they rambled showing their
hips to him', 4. 34; tad bravimi suhrd bhutva
tarunasya vapusmata idam na pratirupam te 'so being a
friend I say to you who are young and well-shaped,
this is not fitting for you', 4. 66. See also verse
2. 44, infra. The following instance of ablative of
comparision is noteworthy: dharmasya tasyasravanad
aham ki manye vipattim tridive pi vasah 'living in
heaven I consider to be an evil worse than not
listening to that dharma', 1. 82. In the following
instance the genitive absolute implies no sense of
anadara: iti pasyata eva rajasunor idam uktva sa
nabhah samutpapata 'while the king's son was thus
look ing on, he, saying this, flew up in the sky' 2.
20.

The 'Buddhacarita' agrees with the epics in
having the locative used in the various case
relations. Thus: d syatam strisu mahatmyam 'let the
excellence of women be noted', 4. 50; yadi tvam
samupeksyeyam na bhaven mitrata mayi 'if I spurn you
1 would not have any friendship (for you)', 4. 65;
prayatasvatmahite jagaddhite ca 'strive for your own
and for world's welfare', 5. 78; api nairgunyam
asmakam vacyam nara patau tvaya' - 'you should also
speak to the king about

p.659

my worthlessness', 6. 24; bodhipraptau samartho'
bhut 'he was successful in winning perfect
knowledge': 12. 109.

One compound formation should be noted:
suhrdbruva 'one who speaks himself as a friend', 8.
35.

The author appears to have been very fond of
desideratives, --nouns, adjectives and verbs, These
are: didrksa 'desire of seeing', 1. 63, etc, ;
jijivisa desiring of living', 8. 12; cikirsi 'desire of
doing', 10.39; jigham- sa, 'desire of killing', 13.
66; vivakesa 'desire of speaking' 10. 22; vivatsa
'desire of dwelling', 7. 42; niscikramisa 'desire of
going out', 5. 66; niscikramisu 'desirous of going
out', 5. 37; vijighamsu, 'desirous of slaying', 5. 43
; mumuksu 'desirous of emancipation', 9. 61, etc.;
amumuksu 'not desirous of emancipation', 8. 77;
nirmumuksu 'desirous of emancipation', 5. 39; yiyasu
'desirous of going' 5. 79, etc.; vijijnasu 'desirous
of knowing', 7. 11, etc.; bubhuksu 'desirous of food,
hungry', 8. 63; pipasu 'desirous of drink,' 8. 80;
titirsu 'desirous of fording or crossing over water',
9. 5, etc.; didrksu 'desirous of seeing', 9. 9, etc.;
jihirsu 'desirous of taking', 11. 15; susrusu
'desirous of hearing', 12, 82; prepsu 'desirous of
getting', 12. 86, etc.; jigisu 'desirous winning',
13. 4; jighrksu 'desirous of taking 13.27; jighamsu
'desirous of slaying', 13. 4; didhaksu 'desirous of
burning', 13. 50; riraksisant 'desiring to protect',
2. 55; arurksant 'desiring to climb, 2. 48; yiyasanti
'they wish to go', 7. 53; paripsanti 'they wish to
attain', 7. 53 etc; jigisanti 'they wish to win', 11.
12; cikirsant 'desiring to do', 13. 18; jighrksati
'he wishes to catch', 8. 64; na cajihirsid balim
aprav ttam na cacikirsit paravastv abhidhyam/ na
cavivaksid dvisatam adharmam na cadidhaksid hrdayena
manyum 'he did not desire to take contributions not
forthcoming; he did not desire the contemplation of
(appropriating) other's property, he did not desire
to teach the wrong to the enemies (even); nor did he
desire to entertain anger at heart': 2. 44. This
beats even the 'Bhattikavya.'

Only one adnominal verbal formation occurs:
karunayamanah 'feeling pity', 3. 45 and 13. 61.

Simple perfect has been used with about 145 roots
and about 645 times. Periphrastic perfects have been
formed from about 22 roots, with as 20 occurrences,
with kr 7, and with bhu 5. The following three
instances, where the cognate accusative parts have
been separated from the main verbal form by the
intrusion of other words, are noteworthy: mat svasa
samaprabhava samvardhayam atmajavad babhuva the
mother's sister, with a mother's authority nursed
(him) like her own son', 2. 19; divyair visesair
mahayam ca cakruh '(the
gods)

p.660

honoured (him) with divine preparations', 6. 58;
'pratyarcayam dharmabhrto babhuva' '(he) worshipped
the pious ones in return', 7. 9. A similar
construction occurs twice in the 'Raghuvamsa': tam
patayam 'prathamam asa papata pascat, '(it) first
felled him and then fell itself', 9. 61;
prabhramsayam yo nahusam cakara 'who caused Nahusa to
fall', 13. 36.

Simple aorist occurs with 11 roots and about 25
times: these roots are: adhii ,gam, car, tap, bhu,
yaj, vac, sak, si and ha. The reduplicated aorist
occurs with , chid, jya1, bhid, and han, and only
once with each. The aorist with desiderative stems
occurs only 4 times; see verse 2. 44, supra. The
ratio between the perfect and the aorist is about 20:
1. This in the main agrees with Kalidasa. The number
of imperfect forms is less than that of the aorist.
The present form with sma has been used as equivalent
to the perfect not infrequently. Constructions with
the passive participle in -ta is anything but rare,
while that with -ta-vant is very scarce; e. g. na yam
vasisthah krtavan asaktih 'what Vasistha, lacking
power, did not do', 1. 47.

There are only two occurrences of the
periphrastic future: kim esa doso bhavita mamapi 'is
it that this evil would happen to me even?, 3. 32; na
punar aham kapilahvayam pravista 'but I shall not
again enter the (city) named Kapila', 5. 84. Note the
absence of asmi in the last instance. The conditional
mood occurs in one verse only: yadi hy ahesisyata
bodhayan janam khuraih ksitau vapy akarisyata
dhvanim/ hanusvanam va 'janayisyad uttamam na
cabhavisyan mama duhkham id sam 'had (the horse)
neighed, waking the people, had it raised noise with
its hoofs (beating) on the ground, had it made good
noise with its jaws, such misery would not have
accrued to me', 8. 4. The precative occurs once only,
in 1. 53.

Peculiar as well as interesting is the following
instance where the finite verbal form asmi 'I am' has
been used for the regular pronoun aham: mu bhun matis
te nrpa kacid anya nihsamsayam tad yad avocam asmi
'may you have no other apprehension, O king:certain
is what I have said', 1, 72. Malliniatha under
'Kiratarjuniya' 3. 6. says, on the authority of the
'Ganavyakhyana', that asmi is also an indeclinable in
the sense of aham, and quotes the parallel: duse
krtagasi bhavaty ucitah prabhunam padaprahara
iti sundari nasmi duye 'a kick to the slave who has
committed an offence, is proper for masters, hence, O
beautiful one, I do not grudge.' This is probobly not
an interpolation as the author uses 'asmi' very
frequently with past participles in -ta. To this can
be compared the periphrasic future forms such as
datcasmi and 'ditaham' (the latter freqnently occurs
in the 'Mahabharata'); cf.

p.661

also, na punar aham kapilahvayam pravista, supra
. The Prakrit future forms like daham=dasyami are
based on periphrastic forms like dataham and not on
the-sya- future: cf. S. K. Chatterji, 'Origin and
Development of the Bengali Language,' 1926, p. 549.

A few anomalous verbal for ms occur: supet, 4. 59
; sisincire for sisincuh 8. 26; nisidatuh for
nisedatuh, 9. 11; 12.3; samupekseyam for samupekseya,
4. 65; vijigaya for vijigye, 1. 28 ff.; the right
from has been used in 2. 34; upatasthuh for
upatasthire, 5. 45 (the right form has been used in
10.19) ; vivarjayitva, paripalayitva for vivariya,
paripalya, 11. 29.

The following perfect participles occur: ucivams
3.43; 5.36; upeyivams 3.8; sameyivams 5.20;
upajagmivams 12.2; tasthusi 4.36; lelikana 13.13.

A chain of conjunctives occurs in one verse:
nihsvasya dirgham sa sirah prakampya tasmims ca jirne
vinivesya caksuh/ tam caiva drstva janatam saharsam
vakyam sa samvignam idam jagada 'heaving a long
(sigh), shaking the head, rivetting (his) eyes on the
old (man), and looking at the rejoicing crowd, he
uttered this sorrowful speech', 3. 35, In quite a
number of instances the conjunctives have been used
incorrectly: tam preksya kasmat tava dhira baspah
'why, O calm one, your tears on seeing him?' 1.68;
ato me dhyanani labdhvapy akrtarthataiva 'hence,
through finding meditations, my lucklessness', 1. 82;
purusasya vayahsukhani bhuktva ramaniyo hi
tapovanapravesah (of man, after enjoying youthful
pleasures, entering the forest is really befitting',
5. 53; evam ca te niseayam etu buddhir drstva
vicitram vividhapracaram 'having seen various ways
let your mind come to determination,' 9. 34; devena
vrste'pi hiranyavarse dvipan samudrams caturo' pi
jitva/ sakrasya cardhasanam apy avapya mandhatur
asid visayaesv atrptih 'notwithstanding the God
raining gold, notwithstanding (his) conquering the
continents and the four oceans, and inspite of (his)
occupying half of Sakra's throne, Mandhatr had
insatiety in enjoyment,' 11. 13; kratoh phalam yady
api sasvatam bhavet tathapi krtva kim upaksayatmakam
'even if the result of sacrifice be permanent, what
is the good of suffering ?'11.65.

The infinitive has been used incorrectly in:
jirnam naram nirmamire prayatum they fashioned a
decrepit man to go', 3.26; tad vijnatum imam dharmam
paramam bhajanam bhavan 'so you are the best person
for knowing this dharma', 12.9.

When reading the 'Buddhacarita' one cannot help
noting that the author was unusually fond of finite
verbs. I quote here some passages

p.662

which can easily pass for extracts from the
grammatical epic, the 'Bhatti kavya': cacara harsah,
prananasa papma jajvala dharmah kalusah sasama 'joy
prevailed, sin died out, dharma blazed forth, evil
abated', 2. 16; same 'bhireme virarama pupad bhrje
damam samvibabhaja sadhun 'he rejoiced in peace,
desisted from evil, practised abstinance, and
honoured the pious', 2.33; nadhyaista duhkhaya parasya
vidyam jnanam sivam yat tu tam adhyagista 'he did not
learn other's knowledge (which comes) for sorrow, but
acquired the knowledge which is good', 2. 35; ekam
vininye sa jugopa sapta saptaiva tatyaja raraksa
panca/ prapa trivargam bubudhe trivargam yajne
dvivargam prajahau dvivargam 'he subordinated the one,
he nurtured the seven; he gave up the seven, he kept
the five; he acquired the triad, he perceived the
triad; he knew the couple, and he rejected the
couple', 2.41.

Asvaghosa apparently wrote in quite good
Sanskrit, although his standard is not that of
Panini. It is nevertheless an authoritative form of
Sanskrit which is also found in the epics and the
'Puranas and is based largely on the spoken usage of
the centuries immediately preceding the birth of
Christ.