Verse 3.1.16

Sanskrit text, Unicode transliteration and English translation of verse 3.1.16:

अदेशानां घटादीनां देशास्संबन्धिनो यथा ।
आकाशस्याप्यदेशस्य देशास्संबन्धिनस्तथा ॥ १६ ॥

adeśānāṃ ghaṭādīnāṃ deśāssaṃbandhino yathā |
ākāśasyāpyadeśasya deśāssaṃbandhinastathā || 16 ||

16. Just as the connected (potsherds etc.) are parts of the jar and the like which (as such) are without divisions, in the same way, the connected objects are the parts of ākāśa which is really without any division.

Commentary

It is also possible to look upon these divisions of ākāśa as real ones and not merely as contingent ones.

[Read verse 16 above]

[In the previous verse, it was declared that words like ākāśa denote a kind of universal on the basis of the contingent divisions of such things as ākāśa. But, perhaps, one can speak of these divisions as real and not contingent. An object like a jar, a whole, is, in itself, partless. Its parts, the potsherds, are its causes and connected with it by the relation of inherence (samavāya). Similarly, the various objects of the world which are in contact with ākāśa and which delimit it are the real divisions of ākāśa. They become the deśa of ākāśa which, being their background, become their deśa too. Ākāśa and the objects become deśa to each other.]

The author now states where the divisions (deśa) are primary and where they are secondary, as, unless they are primary somewhere, we cannot speak of them as being secondary elsewhere.