A Close Look at the Mᾱnas Language : Baleshwar Thakur

Balkeshwar Thakur, Janakpurdham.

Generally, people found a view by hearing from others and become a butt of criticism. Instead, they ought to go deep into the idea themselves and come up with what is right. A philologist, born and brought up between Nepal and Ayodhya in India and exposed to Engilsh and Hindi, can discover on a careful reading that the Mᾱnas is in Hindi and not in Awadhi as many suppose.

A language is a living thing and it keeps on growing with the passage of time. An English reader knows how the English language has developed over times by assimilating, adopting and adapting neighbouring languages. Hindi too has followed the same process to build up itself and flourish all over Ᾱryavarta.

Key words: Mᾱnas, assimilating, adopting, adapting, epic, distribution, kᾱnda, annotator.

After the Vedic Age began the Epic Age in Ᾱryᾱvarta, when two great epics the Rᾱmᾱyana and the Mahᾱbhᾱrata were written. Vᾱlmiki was the first to compose the Rᾱmᾱyana in Sanskrit that, in course of time, was translated into numerous versions of other languages across the land, the most famous being Śrirᾱmacaritamᾱnas, popularly known as the Mᾱnas for short, by Tulasidᾱs in the 16th century. Unfortunately its language aroused a controversy and gained wide currency with the faux pas committed by Jwᾱlᾱ Prasad, an annotator, who remarked at the outset that Tulsidᾱs wrote the epic in the Awadhi language. By the time he stood himself corrected, the idea had lodged into the readers’ mind who but read it with a religious point of view, leaving aside the linguistic lineage that exists between the people of Ayodhya in India and Nepal.

Drawing a conclusion on the basis of speculation and hearsay is a wrong trend. Recently, an Indian woman teacher at a quiz event was heard asserting that the Mᾱnas by Tulasidᾱs is in the Awadhi language. Yet another, who loves to be called Poetess, a poetess Sweta Pandey, was also noticed on her Tiktok giving voice to the same. When cross-questioned, she shied away. Some Nepali philologists, versed both in English and Hindi, navigate none the better. The fault lies not with their expertise rather with their guesswork they take for granted.

In general, people reckon that the language of the Mᾱnas must be Awadhi since its author was born in Ayodhya and also since it was authored there. Here they miss the point: they ought to know that Tulsidas did not live all his life in Ayodhya. Son of a Brᾱhmin, he had to leave for Kashi, the modern Banᾱras, where he had the privilege of studying Vedas, Upanishads, Purans and other scriptures for 15 years at a stretch. After his studies were over, he attended to Rᾱma Kathᾱs told by his gurus and also, he himself travelled to various locations for telling the same, familiarizing with different languages and their dialects.

Truly speaking, Hindi laid its foundation at the hands of Tulasidᾱs assimilating, adopting and adapting contemporary languages, Awadhi in particular and Nepali, Magahi, Bajjika and Bhojpuri in general, all of which have branched off Sanskrit. Surprisingly, there is no tinge of Maithili in the epic. Has the Maithili tongue its roots in Magahi, Bajjikᾱ and Bhojapuri?

A careful reading of the Mᾱnas reveals south-north distribution of the languages mentioned above. Just take the case of the Nepali language. There is no Kᾱnda in it without at least a few Nepali words. The Lankᾱ Kᾱnda tops all with no less than 78 verbs alone, besides the words of other parts of speech. The Following couple of verses on page 777 in Lankᾱ kᾱnda are a striking example:

Mandodari sunyo Phrabhu ᾱyo

Kautukahi pᾱdhodi bandhᾱyo

‘Sunyo’, ‘ᾱyo’ and ‘bandhᾱyo’ are pure Nepali verb words contained by these two very short verse lines. It does not mean that the Mᾱnas is in Nepali. Neither does it imply that it is in the Awadhi language simply because it resembles Awadhi. The thriving of the Hindi language can be likened to the process the English language followed for putting up its empire. The English scholar knows well how the English language, which has not more than 10% of its original words, has especially built itself up on the languages like French, Greek, Latin and others.

The following distinctive features determine the language of the Mᾱnas to be Hindi:

The gender of the verb must agree with the gender of the subject in all tenses, however, in the past when followed by ‘ne’ case- ending, it is not the subject’s gender but object’s the verb’s gender goes with:

sayan kiye dekhᾱ kapi tehee

mandir mahu na deeki baidehi (page no. 719, Sundarkᾱnda)

puni saba kathᾱ bibheeshan kabee

jehi bidhi janak sutᾱ taha rahee (page no. 721, Sundarkᾱnda)

nara bᾱnarahi sanga kahu kaise

kahee kathᾱ bhai sangati jaise  (page no. 726, Sundarkᾱnda)

kahahu tᾱta kehi bhᾱnti jᾱnaki

rahati karati rachchhᾱ swaprᾱnaki (page no. 741, Sundarkᾱnda)

‘ne’ case-ending is deleted from (i), (ii) and (iii) to equate the meter of the verses.

In addition to the concord between nouns, verbs and objects, the agreement between the number of the object and its past verb is also well-observed in the Mᾱnas:

main durbachan kahe bahu tere

kaha muni pᾱpa mitihi kimi mere (page no. 147, Bᾱlakᾱnd)

nᾱth dekhi pada kamala tumhᾱre

aba pure saba kᾱma hamᾱre (page no. 155, Bᾱlakᾱnd )

bachan kahe kachhu janak kumari (page no. 741, Sundarkᾱnd)

‘Durbachan’ and ‘kᾱma’ are plural nouns without ‘ne’ case-ending, therefore the past plural verbs ‘kahe’ and ‘pure’ are matched.‘pᾱpa’ is being plural, the plural possessive adjective ‘mere’ is used.

The Hindi grammar has that the gender of the noun and its pronoun must match together. In the sentence, “mama janakahi tohee rahee mitai”, (you and my father had a friendship), the feminine noun ‘mitai’ and the feminine pronoun ‘tohee’ match together in their gender.

The use of the first person ‘main’ (I) also marks the Mᾱnas to be in Hindi.

These features from (a) to (d) are absent from the other sister languages. The spellings of words used by Tulasidas are those that suited the contemporary common folks. They baffle the modern readers a little as Geoffrey chaucer’s do.

Pt Jawaharlal Nehru, the greatest annotator Hanuman Prasad Poddar and noted Hindi litterateurs share the same point of view that the Mᾱnas has been written in Hindi. In the last chapter titled the Rᾱmayana and the Mahabharat of his book Nehru Letters, Nehru writes on page 79 that Tulsidᾱs composed the greatest epic in Hindi. Hanuman Prasad Poddar comes up with a breathtaking revelation in regard to its language. He says in his biography of Tulasidᾱs that the latter aged 77 first initiated writing it in the Sanskrit language. But then, what he wrote by day vanished by night. This miracle happened for seven consecutive days; thereupon on the eighth night God Mahadeva and Parvati appeared in his sleeping room and asked him to leave kᾱshi for Ayodhya and compose the sacred text there in the Hindi language, so that it would reach more and more devotees of Lord Rama, Who too is His God Who He keeps in His meditation day and night. Tulasidᾱs’s 15th couplet in the Bᾱlkᾱnda is an admission of the episode regarding the language. It reads:

Sapanehun sᾱchehun mohi para jaun Hara Gauri pasau

Tau phoor hohu so kahahu saba bhᾱshᾱ bhanti prabhau.

On top of all that, Hindi litterateurs take the epic for being in the said language. For conformation the readers are suggested to turn on page no. 89 of Hindi Sᾱhitya kᾱ  Itihᾱs by Ᾱchᾱrya  Rᾱmchandra Shukla.

References:

Ᾱcharya, Bhᾱnubhakta (BS2077). Asali Ᾱtha kᾱnda Rᾱmᾱyana: Śri Durga sᾱhitya Bhandᾱr, Nepali khapadᾱ, vᾱrᾱnsi.

Carter, Ronald and Mcrae, John(AD2001). The Routledge History of Literature in English: Routledge Taylor and Francis Group.

Nehru, Jawaharlal(AD1925). Nehru Letters: Oxford University Press.

Poddar, Hanumᾱn Prasad (BS 2071).  Śrirᾱmacaritamᾱnas: Gita Preass, Gorakhpur.

Prasᾱd, Jwalᾱ(AD2016). Śrirᾱmacaritamᾱnas/Rᾱmᾱyana: Rupesh Thakur Prasᾱd, kachauri Gali, vᾱrᾱnsi.

Shukla, Rᾱmchandra Ᾱcharya (AD 2011). Hindi Sᾱhitya kᾱ Itihᾱs: Anupam Prakᾱshan, AShok Rᾱjapath, Patanᾱ.

Wrenn, C.L. (AD1983). The English Language: Vikᾱs Publishing House Pvt Ltd.