Kumarajiva

Alok Bhalla’s lyrical translation of Kumarajiva retains the layers and textures of Narain’s work, weaving into it a philosophical profoundness that honours not just Narain but also the scholar-monk. Traversing the Silk Road in the fourth century ce, Kumarajiva, the son of a Kashmiri Buddhist teacher and a Chinese Princess, radically transformed the history of Buddhism and East Asian culture by translating Buddhist scriptures from Sanskrit and Pali into Chinese. His odyssey along the Silk Road in times of territorial wars and dynastic changes was in search of knowledge of the Self and the Buddha’s moral teachings about the wisdom of following the ‘middle path’ to nirvana, the final liberation from the cycles of rebirth. In Kumarajiva, Kunwar Narain imagines the life of the enlightened Buddhist scholar and monk about whom very little is known. Narain’s elegant and richly composed long narrative poem is a meditation on the mysteries of life and universal truths that hold meaning for all times.