Vaisheshika-sutra with Commentary
by Nandalal Sinha | 1923 | 149,770 words | ISBN-13: 9789332869165
The Vaisheshika-sutra 7.1.3, 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 3 (‘what attributes are eternal’) contained in Chapter 1—Of Colour, Taste, Smell, and Touch, and Magnitude—of Book VII (of the examination of attributes and of combination).
Sūtra 7.1.3 (What attributes are eternal)
Sanskrit text, Unicode transliteration, Word-for-word and English translation of Vaiśeṣika sūtra 7.1.3:
एतेन नित्येषु नित्यत्वमुक्तम् ॥ ७.१.३ ॥
etena nityeṣu nityatvamuktam || 7.1.3 ||
etena—by this; nityeṣu—in eternals; nityatvaṃ—eternality; uktaṃ—stated; Implied.
3. By this is implied eternality (of Colour, etc., which reside) in eternal substances.
Commentary: The Upaskāra of Śaṅkara Miśra:
(English rendering of Śaṅkara Miśra’s commentary called Upaskāra from the 15th century)
If the non-eternality of substrata governs the non-eternality of colour, etc., then, he says, it is obtained from necessary implication, that those colour, etc., which reside in eternal substrata, possess eternality.
[Read sūtra 7.1.3 above]
Of the same four Attributes, colour, etc., present in eternal substrata, eternality is implied ‘by this,’ which means, by the declaration of non-eternality by reason of the non-eternality of the substrata.
The writer of the Vṛtti, however, explains thus:—“nityeṣvanityoktvamuktam”—this is the reading, with the addition of an “a”, (so that instead of ‘eternality,’ the reading is ‘non-eternality.’) Thus, colour, etc., residing in terrene ultimate atoms, disappear on the conjunction of fire.—3.