Vaisheshika-sutra with Commentary
by Nandalal Sinha | 1923 | 149,770 words | ISBN-13: 9789332869165
The Vaisheshika-sutra 5.2.4, English translation, including commentaries such as the Upaskara of Shankara Mishra, the Vivriti of Jayanarayana-Tarkapanchanana and the Bhashya of Chandrakanta. The Vaisheshika Sutras teaches the science freedom (moksha-shastra) and the various aspects of the soul (eg., it's nature, suffering and rebirth under the law of karma). This is sutra 4 (‘causes of flowing of water’) contained in Chapter 2—Of Non-volitional Action—of Book V (of investigation of action).
Sūtra 5.2.4 (Causes of flowing of water)
Sanskrit text, Unicode transliteration, Word-for-word and English translation of Vaiśeṣika sūtra 5.2.4:
द्रवत्वात् स्यन्दनम् ॥ ५.२.४ ॥
dravatvāt syandanam || 5.2.4 ||
dravatvāt—from fluidity; syandanam—flowing.
4. Flowing (results) from fludity.
Commentary: The Upaskāra of Śaṅkara Miśra:
(English rendering of Śaṅkara Miśra’s commentary called Upaskāra from the 15th century)
But how is action, productive of mutual conjunction amongst the drops of water themselves, produced? He gives the answer.
[Read sūtra 5.2.4 above]
By the mutual conjunction of drops of water fallen on earth, a large body of water, in the form of a stream, is produced. And the flowing or distant progression, which takes place in it, is produced from fluidity as its non-combinative cause, and from gravity as its efficient cause, in water drops which are its combinative causes—4.