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 2.140
Sanskrit text, Unicode transliteration and English translation of verse 2.140:
तलबद् दृश्यते व्योम खद्योतो हव्यवाडिव ।
नैव चास्ति तलं व्योन्मि न खद्योतो हुताशनः ॥ १४० ॥talabad dṛśyate vyoma khadyoto havyavāḍiva |
naiva cāsti talaṃ vyonmi na khadyoto hutāśanaḥ || 140 ||140. The sky is perceived as a surface and the firefly as fire. There is no surface in the sky nor is the firefly fire.
Commentary
[Tala is explained in the Bhāmatī and in the Ratnaprabhā as a big frying pan made of sapphire. Naiva cāsti talaṃ vyomni = there is no tala in the sky leads us to take the vat in talavat as a matup suffix and not as the suffix vati. If this is correct, tala may mean nothing more than a part or division. See Ambākartrī on this stanza. See Mahābhārata, Śāntiparvan, adh. 112 for this verse and Nīlakaṇṭha’s commentary thereon.]