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 2.221
Sanskrit text, Unicode transliteration and English translation of verse 2.221:
गर्गा इत्येक एवायं बहुष्वर्थेषु वर्तते ।
द्वन्द्वसंज्ञोऽपि सङ्घातो बहूनामभिधायकः ॥ २२१ ॥gargā ityeka evāyaṃ bahuṣvartheṣu vartate |
dvandvasaṃjño'pi saṅghāto bahūnāmabhidhāyakaḥ || 221 ||221. Just as the word gargāḥ is used for many belonging to the family of garga even though only one word garga is used there, in the same way, the whole called dvandva is expressive of many.
Commentary
Some objections against indivisibility are anticipated and answered. The first objection is that if individual words and their meanings have no reality, then a dvandva compound would only denote an integrated object and cannot, therefore, take the plural number. It is answered as follows—
[Read verse 221 above]
[From the mere fact that a dvandva compound denotes many things and takes the plural number, one cannot conclude that the individual words of a compound and their meanings are real.
The Vṛtti says that the word gargāḥ conveys a meaning which is grasped by a single cognition and in which parts thought of as one figure. Similarly, a dvandva compound seems to have parts similar to other independent words and conveys many objects grasped by one cognition.]
The second objection is that an action would have to be performed at the same time to all the objects denoted by a dvandva compound and that is impossible. The answer is—