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 3.1.41
Sanskrit text, Unicode transliteration and English translation of verse 3.1.41:
पृथिव्यादिष्वभिव्यक्तौ न संस्थानमपेक्षते ।
अनुच्छिन्नाश्रयाज्जातिरनित्येऽप्याश्रये स्थिता ॥ ४१ ॥pṛthivyādiṣvabhivyaktau na saṃsthānamapekṣate |
anucchinnāśrayājjātiranitye'pyāśraye sthitā || 41 ||41. The universal does not depend upon any particular shape for its manifestation in Earth etc. Nor does it become destroyed with its substratum, though the latter is not eternal.
Commentary
After having pointed out that, according to the views of others and of the Grammarians, the universal is the meaning of words, the author now explains its properties.
[Read verse 40 above]
[Universals like earth-ness, water-ness do not require any particular shape or disposition of parts for their mani- festation. A jar appears as earth just as much as a mountain does. But such universals as cowness (gotva) require a particular shape for their manifestation. Secondly, a universal, like a quality exists in its substratum by the relation of inherence (samavāya), but if the substratum is destroyed, the quality is also destroyed, but not the universal. A universal depends upon a substratum only for its manifestation and cognition and not for its very existence].
Where would the universals, inhere when, at the Great Dissolution, even eternal things are destroyed? To this, the author replies as follows: