2023-06-05 16:38:50 by ambuda-bot
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INTRODUCTION
Sri Nilakantha Dikshita was the most considerable figure
in the field of Sanskrit letters in the seventeenth century in South
India. He was in the great scholar-statesman tradition of which
Śri Vidyaranya and Sri Govinda Dikshita were such shining
examples. While in his matchless devotion to his Ishta-devata
he was in no way inferior to his great grand-uncle and exemplar,
Appayya Dikshita, he was a poet and belletrist of even greater
distinction. There is no branch of literature that he did not culti-
vate or adorn. 'Maha-kavya' drama, satire, subhashita,
devotional poetry and the Champu-all came easily and trippingly
to his tongue amidst the manifold preoccupations of a minister's
busy life. And his work is as a rule one of chiselled perfection.
His poetry, especially, is of that rare type which lingers in the
memory. For three hundred years it has provided endless delight
to rasikas. There were few educated men of an earlier generation
who could not effortlessly clinch a moral or adorn a tale with an
apt quotation from the Kalividambana, the Sabharanjana or the
Anyapadesa Sataka.
The Neelakantha-Vijaya Champu is early work; it was written
in his twenty-fifth year. It was undertaken by the Dikshita not for
purely literary reasons, but following the hallowed practice of
many great poets, to exalt his ishta-devata, Parasiva, depicting
Him as the saviour of all creation, Who swallowed the Halāhala
poison out of His abounding compassion and thus showed
Himself superior to every other Power including Mahāvishnu
(I.2). Only, it should be remembered that Paraśiva is not the
third member of the Trinity, Rudra-Siva, but the Saguna
Brahman, invested with form, the Bimba-chaitanya.
In such edificatory works, the depreciation of other gods is
not to be taken too seriously, as is indicated by the well-known
'Nahininda Nyaya'. Apart from this formal justification, it is worth
pointing out that the poet uniformly depicts Mahavishnu (and,
for that matter, Brahmã too) with that exalted reverence which
one reserves for the Supreme in any of Its august manifestations.
He speaks of Vishnu (p. 158) as antaram rahasyam Upanishadam
(the Secret at the heart of the Upanishads); and with the freedom
Sri Nilakantha Dikshita was the most considerable figure
in the field of Sanskrit letters in the seventeenth century in South
India. He was in the great scholar-statesman tradition of which
Śri Vidyaranya and Sri Govinda Dikshita were such shining
examples. While in his matchless devotion to his Ishta-devata
he was in no way inferior to his great grand-uncle and exemplar,
Appayya Dikshita, he was a poet and belletrist of even greater
distinction. There is no branch of literature that he did not culti-
vate or adorn. 'Maha-kavya' drama, satire, subhashita,
devotional poetry and the Champu-all came easily and trippingly
to his tongue amidst the manifold preoccupations of a minister's
busy life. And his work is as a rule one of chiselled perfection.
His poetry, especially, is of that rare type which lingers in the
memory. For three hundred years it has provided endless delight
to rasikas. There were few educated men of an earlier generation
who could not effortlessly clinch a moral or adorn a tale with an
apt quotation from the Kalividambana, the Sabharanjana or the
Anyapadesa Sataka.
The Neelakantha-Vijaya Champu is early work; it was written
in his twenty-fifth year. It was undertaken by the Dikshita not for
purely literary reasons, but following the hallowed practice of
many great poets, to exalt his ishta-devata, Parasiva, depicting
Him as the saviour of all creation, Who swallowed the Halāhala
poison out of His abounding compassion and thus showed
Himself superior to every other Power including Mahāvishnu
(I.2). Only, it should be remembered that Paraśiva is not the
third member of the Trinity, Rudra-Siva, but the Saguna
Brahman, invested with form, the Bimba-chaitanya.
In such edificatory works, the depreciation of other gods is
not to be taken too seriously, as is indicated by the well-known
'Nahininda Nyaya'. Apart from this formal justification, it is worth
pointing out that the poet uniformly depicts Mahavishnu (and,
for that matter, Brahmã too) with that exalted reverence which
one reserves for the Supreme in any of Its august manifestations.
He speaks of Vishnu (p. 158) as antaram rahasyam Upanishadam
(the Secret at the heart of the Upanishads); and with the freedom