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 3.14.100
Sanskrit text, Unicode transliteration and English translation of verse 3.14.100:
यथौषधिरसाः सर्वे मधुन्याहितशक्तयः ।
अविभागेन वर्तन्ते तां सङ्खयां तादृशीं विदुः ॥ १०० ॥yathauṣadhirasāḥ sarve madhunyāhitaśaktayaḥ |
avibhāgena vartante tāṃ saṅkhayāṃ tādṛśīṃ viduḥ || 100 ||100. That number is said to be like honey in which the flavours of different plants have been deposited and exist in an undifferentiated form.
Commentary
[It is like the flavour of honey which is an undifferentiated combination of the flavours of many flowers. The properties of the honey depend upon the properties of the flowers whose flavours have made it up. As any required number can be understood from the secondary constituent of a compound, one infers that all numbers exist in an undifferentiated state in abhedaikatvasaṃkhyā. It is really not a number at all. One cannot count anything with it. But it is called saṃkhyā, because a particular number, according to need, can be understood from it.]
Another way of looking at it is as follows—