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 2.60
Sanskrit text, Unicode transliteration and English translation of verse 2.60:
प्रतिवर्णमसंवेद्यः पदार्थप्रत्ययो यथा ।
पदेष्वेवमसंवेद्यं वाक्यार्थस्य निरूपणम् ॥ ६० ॥prativarṇamasaṃvedyaḥ padārthapratyayo yathā |
padeṣvevamasaṃvedyaṃ vākyārthasya nirūpaṇam || 60 ||60. Just as the meaning of the word is not understood from each phoneme, in the same way, the meaning of the sentence is not understood from each word.
Commentary
[Here the Vṛtti makes an interesting observation. It says that the cognition of the sentence meaning is self-luminous, besides illuminating the external object. Being self-luminous, the cognition of the sentence-meaning is authority in itself. The sentence-meaning which its cognition grasps is one and indivisible and being authority, it confirms the unity and indivisibility of the sentence-meaning.]
To meet this, the upholder of the individual word says—
[Read next verse]