Verse 961-963

Sanskrit text, Unicode transliteration and English translation by Ganganath Jha:

भवद्भिः शब्दभेदोऽपि तन्निमित्तो न लभ्यते ।
न ह्यसाधारणः शब्दो वाचकः प्रागदृष्टितः ॥ ९६१ ॥
तत्र शब्दान्तरापोहे सामान्ये परिकल्पिते ।
तथैवावस्तुरूपत्वाच्छब्दभेदो न कल्प्यते ॥ ९६२ ॥
वाचकानां यथा चैवं वाच्यवाचकयोर्मिथः ।
न चाप्यपोह्यभेदेन भेदोऽस्तीत्युपपादितम् ॥ ९६३ ॥

bhavadbhiḥ śabdabhedo'pi tannimitto na labhyate |
na hyasādhāraṇaḥ śabdo vācakaḥ prāgadṛṣṭitaḥ || 961 ||
tatra śabdāntarāpohe sāmānye parikalpite |
tathaivāvasturūpatvācchabdabhedo na kalpyate || 962 ||
vācakānāṃ yathā caivaṃ vācyavācakayormithaḥ |
na cāpyapohyabhedena bhedo'stītyupapāditam || 963 ||

“You cannot base the diversity among words also upon the said conditions. there can be no ‘uncommon’ denotative word, as no such could have been perceived before. Under the circumstances, if a ‘commonalty’ were assumed in the shape of the ‘Apoha (exclusion) of other words’,—as it could only be a non-entity, as shown above, there could be no diversity among words.—Just as among denotative words, so between the ‘denoted’ and ‘denotative’ also there could be no difference. That there can be no ‘difference’ based upon the difference in the ‘excluded things’ has already been explained.”—[Ślokavārtika-Apoha 102, 104, 105]—(961-963)

 

Kamalaśīla’s commentary (tattvasaṃgrahapañjikā):

Having thus discarded ‘Apoha’ as the ‘denoted’, the Opponent of the Buddhist proceeds to discard it also as held to be the ‘denotative’:—[see verses 961-963 above]

The term ‘Śabdabhedaḥ’ stands for the mutual difference among words denotative of diverse Universals and those denotative of Particulars.

‘Upon the said conditions’,—i.e. based upon the diversity of Impressions or on the diversity of the ‘Excluded Apohas’.

Objection:—‘Among words, diversity is clearly perceived, as based upon their source and upon the imposition on them of mutually contradictory characters’.

Answer:—‘There can be no uncommon word, etc. etc.’—What is said here is with reference to the denotative word; and what is meant is that the uncommon word, which is apprehended in auditory Perception, as of the nature of a ‘Specific Individuality’, cannot be denotative.—Why?—Because no such could have been perceived before; that is, the Word that is there at the time of usage will not have been perceived before that usage,—i.e. at the time of the making of the Convention relating to it; and the word that was perceived at that time will have long ceased to exist, so that there could be no usage of that word; nor is it right that there should be any usage based upon the word that was not perceived at the time of the Convention; as that would lead to incongruities.—From all this it follows that the Specific Individuality cannot be denotative.

In fact, among you yourselves, there is a difference on this point; as it has been stated (by one of yourselves) that—‘no particular thing can be denoted, and no particular word can be denotative, because it has not been perceived before; it is the Commonalty (Universal) that will be so, as is going to be explained—Hence no objection can be taken to what we have said regarding the denotative word.

Such being the case, ii it be held that what is denotative is the ‘Exclusion of other words,’ in the form of the ‘Word—Universal’,—in the same way as the ‘Exclusion of other things’ is of the form of the ‘Tiling—Universal’,—then, as shown above, under Text 926,—as there can be no diversity among the denoted Apohas, so there can be no diversity among the denotative Apohas also; because these latter are featureless.

And just as there can be no difference among the denotative Apohas, so also there can be no difference between the denotative and the denoted Apohas; because these also are featureless.

It might be argued that there may be difference among these, due to the differences among the Excluded things.—The answer to that is—‘That there can be no difference, etc. etc.’;—that is, how there can be no difference due to difference among the excluded things has been already explained above, under Text 928.—(961-963)