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 2.95
Sanskrit text, Unicode transliteration and English translation of verse 2.95:
रूपनाशे पदानां स्यात् कथं चावधिकल्पना ।
अगृहीतावधौ शब्दे कथं चार्थो विवच्यते ॥ ९५ ॥rūpanāśe padānāṃ syāt kathaṃ cāvadhikalpanā |
agṛhītāvadhau śabde kathaṃ cārtho vivacyate || 95 ||95. How is one to determine the limits of an individual word considering that its form changes. If its limits are not determined, how can its meaning be fixed?
Commentary
[In the sentence dadhyānaya, the word dadhi has changed its form into dadhy because of what follows.]
If a sentence is indivisible, how can the sentence śveto dhāvati be the answer to two different questions at the same time? This is answered as follows—