Part 2 - A brief account of Tattvabindu

The Tattvabindu is a work on the Bhāṭṭa School of Pūrvamīmāṃsā written by Vācaspati Miśra, the celebrated author and creative genius. It is a gloss (prakaraṇa) of the Bhāṭṭa Mīmāṃsā. The word Tattvabindu has its two parts tattva and bindu. The word tattva means verbal knowledge or verbal comprehension (śābdabodha) and the other word bindu means efficient cause. This is a work dealing with verbal knowledge (śābdabodha), which is the main topic of the Mīmāṃsā system otherwise known as the vākyaśāstra. Here, śābdabodha is a total knowledge arising from words in a sentence.

The main theme of the Tattvabindu is what is the nimitta kāraṇa (efficient cause) of śābdabodha (verbal knowledge). There are five traditional views regarding this subject found in the philosophical systems and in grammar. Of these views, four are considered prima facie (pūrvapakṣa) and the fifth siddhānta or uttarapakṣa in the Tattvabindu.

First view of Śābdabodha

The first view is the sphoṭavāda of the grammarians (Vaiyākaraṇas). The Vaiyākaraṇas (the sphoṭavādins) hold that the vākyasphoṭa conveys the vākyārtha (the meaning of the sentence) and they describe the sphoṭa as being devoid of parts (avayavas) though it is experienced as possessing avayavas through our avidyā (ignorance).^[1]

The sphoṭavāda is the view according to which, in order to understand how from the diversity of letters and words a unit of meaning can spring up, one must suppose, beyond the plane of immediate perception, an indivisible sound-entity which should be the substratum and substantial cause of meaning. So, at the level of ordinary speech in Vedic and daily language, there would be first a sphoṭa of the word, a word-entity in which the splitting into letters would be impossible, and which would make the meaning of the word intelligible, then a sphoṭa of the sentence which in its turn could not be splitted into words and which alone would be able to give its unity to the sentence meaning.

Second view of Śābdabodha

The view of some Mīmāṃsakas that the cognition of the last letter (varṇa) of the sentence coupled with the impressions produced by the experiences of the previous words with their meanings is the cause of the vākyārthajñāna.^[2] This view is also called varṇavāda, which belongs essentially to the Naiyāyika.

Third view of Śābdabodha

This view is propounded by the Mīmāṃsakas such as Upavarśa and others. They hold that the cause of the vākyārthajñāna is the varṇamālā i.e. the group of varṇas which are reflected in the mirror of recollection produced by the family of impressions generated by the experiences of each varṇa, pada and padārtha (the meanings of words).^[3]

Fourth view of Śābdabodha

The Ṭīkākāra (Prabhākara) maintains that the cause of the vākyārthapratīti is the cognition of the padas themselves which convey their meanings related to one another on the basis of ākāṅkṣā, yogyatā and sannidhi. This is called anvitābhidhānavāda.^[4]

Fifth view of Śābdabodha

Ācārya Kumārila Bhaṭṭa whom Vācaspati Miśra closely follows in this work, suggests that words convey their meanings (padārthas) which, in their turn (while mutually related) generate the śābdabodha i.e. the cognition of the vākyārtha. This siddhāntin’s view or the view of the Bhāṭṭa school is called abhihitānvayavāda.^[5]

These five views of the efficient cause of śābdabodha are discussed by Vācaspati Miśra in his work Tattvabindu and finally, abhihitānvayavāda has been established as the most satisfactory theory among the theories that are advanced by the different schools of thought in respect of the efficient cause of vākyārthajñāna.

Footnotes and references:

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[1]:

anavayavameva vākyamanādyavidyopadarśitālīkavarṇapadavibhāgamasyā nimittamiti kecit/ Tattvabindu , p. 3

[2]:

pāramārthikapūrvapūrvapadapadārthānubhavajanitasaṃskārasahitamantyavarṇavijñā-namityeke / Ibid.

[3]:

pratyekavarṇapadapadārthānubhavabhāvitabhāvanānicayalabdhajanmasmṛtidarpaṇā-rūḍhā varṇamālā ityanye / Ibid., p. 4

[4]:

padānyevākāṅkṣita-yogya-sannihitapadārthāntarānvitasvārthābhidhāyīnītyapare / Ibid.

[5]:

padaireva samabhivyāhāravadbhirabhihitāḥ svārthā ākāṅkṣā-yogyatāsattisadhrīcīnā vākyārthadhīhetava ityācāryāḥ / Ibid.