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.

Sanskrit text, Unicode transliteration and English translation of verse 2.115:

आवृत्तिरनुवादो वा पदार्थव्यक्तिकल्पने ।
प्रत्येकं तु समाप्तोऽर्थः सहभूतेषु वर्तते ॥ ११५ ॥

āvṛttiranuvādo vā padārthavyaktikalpane |
pratyekaṃ tu samāpto'rthaḥ sahabhūteṣu vartate || 115 ||

115. Repetition or restatement tends to make the meaning of the word clearer. All the words belonging to a sentence being present the meaning of (the whole) sentence is present in each of them.

Commentary

It might be said against the anvitābhidhāna that, if the very. first word expresses the particularised meaning, the remaining words would be useless. This is answered as follows—

[Read verse 115 above]

[The defect mentioned is removed by pointing out that the other words would serve the puṛpose of restricting and specifying the other words with whose meaning the meaning of the first word is connected. It is also pointed out that even when the other words are not yet uttered, they are already present in the mind of the speaker and so they serve to determine the meaning of the first word, to give it a certain completeness. See verse 18.]

It is now stated how the indivisible sentence is divided by some.

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