Jain Mahābhāratas in Classical Hindi: Bulākīdās’ PāṇḍavPurāṇ

Presenters:

---

Abstract

Episodes from the Mahābhārata can be found from the earliest strata of Jain literature. Over the centuries, Jain poets adapted the epic in compositions in various literary languages, both classical and vernacular, including Classical Hindi. Scholarship (e.g., Cort 2013, Clines 2018, Plau 2018, Bangha 2013) has only started to disclose the vast corpus of high quality Jain literature in Classical Hindi, and its significance for North Indian literary culture. This paper represents the first attempt at exploring the Pāṇḍavpurāṇ of Bulākīdās (17th c.), a self-proclaimed bhāṣā of the Sanskrit Pāṇḍavapurāṇa, composed just a century earlier by Śubhacandra (1552). By conducting a close reading of one selected episode, we will examine the modifications made by the poet to conform his work to the requirements of contemporary Classical Hindi literature (e.g. Plau 2018 on Rāmcand Bālak’s adaptation of Raviṣeṇa’s Jain Rāmāyaṇa), and the extent in which he stays true to Śubhacandra’s Pāṇḍavapurāṇa in Sanskrit.