Text 10.4

उदाहरणम्,

udāharaṇam,

Here the three varieties of the complete direct simile are shown in sequence:

bhāratī sumadhurā sudhā yathā moda-kṛd vidhur ivāsya-maṇḍalaḥ |
saubhagaṃ tava hare paṭīra-van nāgarī tvayi na kānurajyate ||

bhāratī—speech (eloquence); su-madhurā—very sweet; sudhā—nectar; yathā—like; moda—delight; kṛt—makes; vidhuḥ—the moon; iva—like; āsya—of the face; maṇḍalaḥ—the orb; saubhagam—good fortune (loveliness); tava—Your; hare—O Hari; paṭīra-vat—like [the loveliness of] sandalwood paste (i.e. good luck sticks to Him); nāgarī—a city woman (a clever woman); tvayi—about You; na—not; kā—which woman?; anurajyate—is passionate.

Eloquence is as sweet as nectar.

The orb of a face causes delight like the moon.

O Hari, Your loveliness is like that of sandalwood paste: Which clever woman is not enamored of You?

atra krameṇa śrautī-trayam. vidhur ivety atra ivena samāso vibhakty-alopaś ca iti samāsaḥ paṭīra-vad iti ṣaṣṭhy-antād ivārthe vatiḥ.

The first example is a simile in a sentence (bhāratī sumadhurā sudhā yathā). The second one is a simile in a compound: vidhur-iva (like the moon), because by rule iva is always compounded and there is no deletion of the case ending of the first word. The third example, paṭīra-vat, is a simile in a taddhita suffix: Here the suffix vat[i] has the sense of iva (like) and the word connected with it ends in the genitive case.

Commentary:

The first example is a simile in a sentence because a word expressive of comparison is used and the simile does not occur in a compound nor in conjunction with a taddhita suffix. Regarding the second example (vidhur-iva), the grammatical rule is that iva always forms a compound with the preceding word, and that word does not lose its case ending (only the visarga becomes deleted).^[1] However, the international standard of transliteration is not to hyphen a compound with iva, therefore the transliteration in the text is: vidhur iva.

In a direct simile, the suffix vat[i] is in the scope of the rule tatra tasyeva (Aṣṭādhyāyī 5.1.116) (10.3 vṛtti). This means the compound formed with vat[i] has the sense of either the locative case (like the […] in that place) or the genitive case (like the […] of that entity). Here paṭīra-vat means: paṭīrasya saubhagam iva, “like the loveliness of sandalwood paste.” The word saubhagam (loveliness) in the text is carried forward into the meaning of the compound.

However, Paṇḍita-rāja Jagannātha points out that the word iva is not compounded with the previous word if the subject has an adjective.^[2] In such occurrences, Jagannātha places iva after the adjective, without making a compound. There is no hard-and-fast rule.

For example:

kim etad adbhutam iva vāsudeve’khilātmani |
vrajasya sātmanas tokeṣv apūrvaṃ prema vardhate ||

“[Balarāma speaks:] The love of the multitude, inclusive of Me, for the offsprings is unprecedented and increases like their love for Vāsudeva, the Soul of all. What is this wonder?” (Bhāgavatam 10.13.36).

Here the word iva is randomly placed after the word adbhutam although it is syntactically connected with vāsudeve, according to Viśvanātha Cakravartī,^[3] yet vāsudeve has the adjective akhilātmani. The gist is that such a simile with iva is classed as a simile in a sentence, not as a simile in a compound.

Jagannātha gives an example:

grīṣma-caṇḍakara-maṇḍala-bhīṣma-jvāla-saṃsaraṇa-tāpita-mūrteḥ |
prāvṛṣeṇya iva vāridharo me vedanāṃ haratu vṛṣṇi-vareṇyaḥ ||

“As a raincloud dispels the affliction of a person whose body is scorched by going (saṃsaraṇa) in an open area where the blazingness of the summer sun is terrible, so may Kṛṣṇa, the best of the Vṛṣṇis, take away my affliction: My body is pained by material life (saṃsaraṇa = saṃsāra), which dreadfully burns like the summer sun” (Rasa-gaṅgādhara).

In this example, prāvṛṣeṇyaḥ (related to the monsoon) is the adjective of vāridharaḥ (cloud); iva is placed after the adjective yet no compound is made.^[4]

Footnotes and references:

[1]:

ivena vibhakty-alopaḥ pūrva-pada-prakṛti-svaratvaṃ ca (Vārttika 2.2.18) (sometimes stated as: ivena saha nitya-samāso vibhakty-alopaḥ pūrva-pada-prakṛti-svaratvaṃ ca vaktavyam); ivena samāso vibhakty-alopaś ca (Siddhānta-kaumudī 650).

[2]:

This is because the general rule is that two words cannot be compounded if there is a dependence on another word: samarthaḥ pada-vidhiḥ (Aṣṭādhyāyī 2.1.1); sa ca parasparasambandhārthānāṃ sv-ādy-antānām (Hari-nāmāmṛta-vyākaraṇa 917). This rule does not apply to the suffix vat[i].

[3]:

kim etad iti. vāsudeva iveti vāsudeve yathā purā prema tathā svatokeṣvapi vrajasya prema vardhate kim etad adbhutaṃ kiñca sātmanaḥ mat-sahitasyāpi teṣu kṛṣṇa-vat prema kim ity arthaḥ (Sārārtha-darśinī 10.13.36).

[4]:

Jagannātha introduces the verse in this way: tatra pūrṇā śrautī vākya-gatā yathā. Afterward he comments: atra prāvṛṣeṇya ity anena vāridhara-viśeṣaṇena nairākāṅkṣyāt, ivena samāsaḥ [ity eva pāṭhān nityatvābhāvād vāridhareṇāpi nevasya samāsaḥ]. eṣā copamānopameyayor vāridharabhagavator vedanā-haraṇa-kartṛtvasya sādhāraṇa-dharmasya sādṛśya-bodhakasyeva-śabdasya cābhidhānāt pūrṇā sādṛśasya śrutyā bodhanāc chrautī (Rasa-gaṅgādhara, KM pp. 163-164). The words in square brackets are from the Caukhambā edition.