Vakyapadiya of Bhartrihari
by K. A. Subramania Iyer | 1965 | 391,768 words
The English translation of the Vakyapadiya by Bhartrihari including commentary extracts and notes. The Vakyapadiya is an ancient Sanskrit text dealing with the philosophy of language. Bhartrhari authored this book in three parts and propounds his theory of Sphotavada (sphota-vada) which understands language as consisting of bursts of sounds conveyi...
This book contains Sanskrit text which you should never take for granted as transcription mistakes are always possible. Always confer with the final source and/or manuscript.
Verse 1.3
Sanskrit text, Unicode transliteration and English translation of verse 1.3:
अध्याहितकलां यस्य कालशक्तिमुपाश्रिताः ।
जन्मादयो विकाराः षड् भावभेदस्य योनयः ॥ ३ ॥adhyāhitakalāṃ yasya kālaśaktimupāśritāḥ |
janmādayo vikārāḥ ṣaḍ bhāvabhedasya yonayaḥ || 3 ||3. Depending on whose Time-power to which (though one) differentiation is attributed, the six transformations, birth etc. become the cause of all variety in Being.
Commentary
All powers1 depending on their causes and having a starting point are governed by the creative power (svātantrya) called Time; they follow the modes of this Time-power. Because of the regulation of the immense diversity of each object by means of prevention and permission, its appearances seem to have a sequence. Time, by allowing them to come to be is the secondary cause of all transformations which depend on their own other causes also and whose production had been delayed.2 Its causal power being thus differentiated by the manifestations which have a sequence, the differentiation which exists in the manifestations is attributed to it. It is like attributing to the balance the divisions marked by lines on it at the time of the balancing of the weight of the material which is in contact with it.3 Thus when sequence is attributed to something which is neither prior nor posterior in the form ‘it was’ or ‘it was not,’ the six transformations birth etc., become the source of the modifications, the changes in Being. Transformation of action will be dealt with in detail in the section devoted to ‘Being’ under the subject of universal.
Notes
1. Vṛṣabha explains śaktayaḥ as padārthāḥ by identifying cause and effect.
2. pratibaddhajanmanām. Though all the mss of the Vṛtti have pratibandha,° the text adopted is probably the genuine one. The explanation of Vṛṣabha—yeṣāmevānena prathamata utpattau pratibandhaḥ kṛtaḥ te pratibaddhajanmānaḥ’ also supports the emendation.
3. While explaining the analogy of the balance, Vṛṣabha uses the terms tulāsūtra, tulādaṇḍa, tulāpaṭala and daṇḍalekhā. The rod type of balance seems to be referred to. The thing to be weighed is placed on a pan (tulāpaṭala) which hangs from one end of the rod (tulādaṇḍa) which is held by a string (tulāsūtra) at one of the points marked by a line on the rod (daṇḍalekhā) according to the weight of the thing weighed.