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 3.1.27
Sanskrit text, Unicode transliteration and English translation of verse 3.1.27:
निर्वर्त्त्यमानं यत्कर्म जातिस्तत्रापि साधनम् ।
स्वाश्रयस्याभिनिष्पत्तौ सा क्रियाणां प्रयोजिका ॥ २७ ॥nirvarttyamānaṃ yatkarma jātistatrāpi sādhanam |
svāśrayasyābhiniṣpattau sā kriyāṇāṃ prayojikā || 27 ||27. The universal is the cause even of that object which is newly produced. In order that its substratum might be produced, it prompts the action to come to be.
Commentary
As the universal exists even before the individual is produced, it is eternal. How it helps is now stated.
[Read verse 27 above]
[In a sentence like sa Kaṭaṃ Karoti (he makes a mat), ‘mat’ is the object of the action of making. In other words, it is a sādhana, an accessory of the action of making. Before it is made, it does not exist. How can it then become a sādhana? To this objection, the answer is that its universal was already present in its causes and it is that which helps in its production. The universal aspect of it is the sādhana and the individual (vyakti) aspect of it is the effect (Kārya). After all, the universal and the individual are not two totally different things like a cow and a horse. They are indissolubly mixed up. They are two aspects of the same thing which gets two names accordingly. Why the universal is called prayojikā is this: Before a man makes a mat, he has the universal of it in his mind and then proceeds to assemble the material. But for that, he would not act. It is the universal which prompts him].
The author now states that, according to the view that the word denotes, the universal, it is not the individual which is the accessory of an action (sādhana), but the universal.