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 2.459:

एकसंख्येषु भेदेषु भिन्ना जात्यादिभिः क्रियाः ।
भेदेन विनियुज्यन्ते तच्छब्दस्य सकृच्छ्रुतौ ॥ ४५९ ॥

ekasaṃkhyeṣu bhedeṣu bhinnā jātyādibhiḥ kriyāḥ |
bhedena viniyujyante tacchabdasya sakṛcchrutau || 459 ||

459. Where actions differ from one another in their universals etc, (and are conveyed by different words) and the accessories are also of the same number but are conveyed by the same word uttered once, the former are separately connected with the latter.

Commentary

It was stated before how many actions conveyed by the same word are connected with different accessories conveyed by different words. Now how many actions conveyed by different words are connected with different accessories conveyed by the same word is stated.

[Read verse 459 above]

[In akṣā bhajyantām, bhujyantām, dīvyantām, the three verbs denote three different actions unconnected with one another and are conveyed by three different words. The word akṣāḥ conveys three different accessories though it is uttered only once by the speaker. But the hearer connects each accessory with one of the verbs and thus gets the complete sentence. ]

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