Yoga-sutras (with Bhoja’s Rajamartanda)

by Rajendralala Mitra | 1883 | 103,575 words

The Yoga-Sutra 1.42, English translation with Commentaries. The Yogasutra of Patanjali represents a collection of aphorisms dealing with spiritual topics such as meditation, absorption, Siddhis (yogic powers) and final liberation (Moksha). The Raja-Martanda is officialy classified as a Vritti (gloss) which means its explanatory in nature, as opposed to being a discursive commentary.

Sanskrit text, Unicode transliteration and English translation of Sūtra 1.42:

शब्दार्थज्ञानविकल्पैः सङ्कीर्णा सवितर्का समापत्तिः ॥ १.४२ ॥

śabdārthajñānavikalpaiḥ saṅkīrṇā savitarkā samāpattiḥ || 1.42 ||

42. The argumentative is that which is influenced by the fancy of word, meaning, and understanding.

The Rajamartanda commentary by King Bhoja:

[English translation of the 11th century commentary by Bhoja called the Rājamārtaṇḍa]

[Sanskrit text for commentary available]

Having explained the conditions, he now points out its fourfold differences (in three aphorisms.)

[Read Sūtra 1.42]

That which is perceivable by the organ of hearing, or is an explosion or bursting of sound (sphoṭa), is (technically sound or) “word” (śabda). “Meaning” (artha) is (the sense conveyed by the word indicating) a genus (such as the cow or the horse). “Understanding” (jñāna) is a function of the intellect in which the quality of truth prevails (in preference to the other two qualities). “Fancy” (vikalpa) has been already defined (A. IX) “Affected” (saṅkīrṇa) influenced by them, i.e., by the three, words &c. That modification, in which the three (words &c.) are apparent in an undefined fanciful shape, (i.e., their relations are doubtful in the mind), as the word gau “a cow,” meaning a cow, and conveying the notion of a cow, is called “argumentative,” (savitarka.)

Notes and Extracts

[Notes and comparative extracts from other commentaries on the Yogasūtra]

[The conditions adverted to in the preceding aphorism are fourfold, and thereof the first is called argumentative, inasmuch as in that condition the thinking principle fancies or doubtfully accepts a thing without positive discrimination of the relations between a word or its meaning and the idea conveyed by it.

The Pātañjala Bhāṣya explains it by saying,

gauriti śabdo Gaurityartho Gauriti jñānamityavibhāgena vibhaktānāmapi grahanam dṛṣṭam.

Gau is the word, a cow is its meaning, and the idea is that of a cow, and accepting these distinct positions in an undivided form.”

The P. Rahasya puts it more clearly by saying “when on hearing the word there is a doubt as to whether the gau is a word, or it is a meaning, or it is an understanding.—

Gauriti śabde śrute sati gauriti śabdo vā gaurityartho vā gauriti jñānam vā evamvikalpah. (See p. 18.)

This is an inferior condition.

The word sphoṭa, which 1 have rendered into “bursting,” is the technical name of the sound which is eternal, and of which spoken words are but manifestations. The theory of some grammarians is that words are eternal, and they become manifest when spoken. Dr. Ballantyne, in his essay on Hindu Philosophy, has given a full account of this dogma.]

The opposite of it or the non-argumentative is next described.

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