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 3.11.17
Sanskrit text, Unicode transliteration and English translation of verse 3.11.17:
एकत्वसमुदायो वा सापेक्षे वा पृथक् पृथक् ।
एकत्वे द्वित्वमित्येवं तयोर्द्विवचनं भवेत् ॥ १७ ॥ekatvasamudāyo vā sāpekṣe vā pṛthak pṛthak |
ekatve dvitvamityevaṃ tayordvivacanaṃ bhavet || 17 ||17. (Another view is) that duality is a collection, of two unities related to each other. But if duality is nothing more than two unities, there should be dual number whenever duality is spoken of.
Commentary
[Others again believe that duality is really not something different from the unities. The forest is really not different from the trees. Two is only a name for the collection of two units. Three is a name of a collection of three units. But if duality is not a separate entity, but stands for two unities, one cannot account for the dual number in dvyekayor dvivacanaikavacane (P. 1.4.22) because there are altogether three units here and the plural is called for. Therefore, duality must be looked upon as a new unit produced by the two unities. This applies to trinity etc. up to ten. But, if duality is a new unit, a unit, being one, why even use the dual or the plural in connection with duality and the higher units? This is answered in the next stanza.]