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 1.73
Sanskrit text, Unicode transliteration and English translation of verse 1.73:
पदे न वर्णा विद्यन्ते वर्णेष्ववयवा न च ।
वाक्यात् पदानामत्यन्तं प्रविवेको न कश्चन ॥ ७३ ॥pade na varṇā vidyante varṇeṣvavayavā na ca |
vākyāt padānāmatyantaṃ praviveko na kaścana || 73 ||73. There are no phonemes in the word nor are there parts in the phoneme. There is no absolute difference of the words from the sentence.
Commentary
As the effort relating to the whole as a collection of phonemes is different and, therefore, the sounds uttered to suggest the word are also different, there takes place, from the different cognitions having the appearance of the cognitions of the real phonemes, a perception of the word caused by means of the perception of parts in the form of phonemes. But it is really without sequence, without before and after, one, eternal, indivisible and it appears as a unit produced by smaller elements, the phonemes. But the further divisions of the phonemes like a, indescribable, beyond usage, considered different, are really fictitious. Therefore, their clearly intelligible unity is well-known in the usage of the Science of Grammar. As it is the sentence, whether consisting of one word or of many words, which is used to express the meaning, there arises a perception of the word as means to the perception of the sentence. In regard to the sentence, there arise cognitions having sequence and having the form of phonemes and words, but they are not identified with the sentence. Therefore, phonemes and words have no separate existence from the sentence so defined, unbreakable, indivisible.