Avadānakalpalatāに見られる象の描写について : ダナパーラ物語を中心として

The Description of Elephants in the Avadānakalpalatā: The Legend of Dhanapāla

YAMASAKI Kazuho

比較論理学研究

The Annals of the Research Project Center for the Comparative Study of Logic

[PISSN] 1880-6376

[NCID] AA12025285

The Avadānakalpalatā by the Kashmiri poet Kṣemendra (ca. 990–1066 CE) is a collection of Buddhist legends presented in 108 chapters. In the twenty-eighth chapter of this work, the poet depicts the legend of the elephant Dhanapāla. Out of the sixty-nine verses that describe the legend, verses 18–20 are significant from the point of view of poetics. In this paper, I examine Kṣemendra’s view of poetry, focusing on the verses in question.
In verse 18, Kṣemendra, using a simile to compare an elephant (gaja) and bees (bhṛṅgāṇām) to a bad king (duṣpatiḥ) and his courtiers (bhṛtyānām), respectively, gives a double meaning to the modifiers modifying the objects of comparison (i.e., a bad king and courtiers) as the same modifiers modify the subjects of comparison (i.e., an elephant and bees). The literary theorist Daṇḍ in classifies this type of simile as a punned simile (śliṣṭopamā). The marked characteristic of the punned simile used by Kṣemendra in verse 18 is that the pun is constructed without using any artificial or far-fetched expressions.
In verse 19, while describing how Dhanapāla rushed towards the Buddha, Kṣemendra employs the words containing the dental consonant /d/, as in mandiropadrave tasmin drumadrohiṇy abhidrute. The verse from the Bālarāmāyaṇa (8.27) ascribed to Rājaśekhara (ca. ninth- to tenth-century CE) is of special interest as we can find the alliteration of the dental consonants /d/ and /dh/ in the description of the demon Kumbhakarṇa being trampled by a herd of elephants. This fact suggests that both Kṣemendra and Rājaśekhara use the repetition of voiced dental consonants as a means to remind listeners of the sound of trampling elephants.
Verse 20 provides a description of Dhanapāla going on a rampage. It is written in a vigorous style called gauḍī, characterized by the use of long compound words and cerebral consonants. According to literary theorists, a vigorous style is suited for producing a furious sentiment (raudrarasa), which suggests that Kṣemendra might be trying to invoke the same sentiment. However, we must note that one can find the words sādhvasa (“terror”), sambhrama (“confusion”), and uddaṇḍacaṇḍaśuṇḍabhramaṇarava (“raising his powerful trunk, roaming around [the street], and then trumpeting”), which are used to describe the determinant (sthāyibhāva), the transitory state (vyabhicāribhāva), and the gesture (ceṣṭā) of a terrifying sentiment (bhayānakarasa), respectively. In his Aucityavicāracarcā, Kṣemendra allows a poet to use a mixture of sentiments on the condition that the subordinate (aṅga) sentiment should not be more developed than the predominant (aṅgin) sentiment. Therefore, it is reasonable to deduce that in verse 20, Kṣemendra suggests two sentiments, namely, the terrifying and the furious, and that the former is predominant, whereas the latter is subordinate.
The following conclusion can be drawn from the survey of verses 18–20. Kṣemendra holds the view that a poet should not indulge in a display of verbal ingenuity but suggest a particular sentiment by means of words expressive of emotions and ornaments of speech.

jpn

広島大学比較論理学プロジェクト研究センター

[ISSN] 1880-6376

[NCID] AA12025285