Vakyapadiya (study of the concept of Sentence)
by Sarath P. Nath | 2018 | 36,088 words
This page relates ‘Naiyayikas' View on Sentence-Meaning� of the study on Vakyapadiya by Bhartrhari and his treatment of the Concept of Sentence in Language. Bhartrhari was a great grammarian and philosopher who explored the depth and breadth of Sanskrit grammar. These pages analyse the concepts and discussions on sentence and sentence-meaning presented in the Vakyapadiya, against the different systems of knowledge prevalent in ancient India (such as Mimamsa, Nyaya and Vyakarana).
Go directly to: Footnotes.
4.2. ⾱첹' View on Sentence-Meaning
ⲹśٰ is renowned as ' ʰṇaśٰ', and hence, the concept of sentence and sentence-meaning are not the only concern of it. As ⲹԳٲṭṭ states, the ancient ⾱첹 did not give much importance to the discussions on language (1970, p.143). But it is to be noted that the School of Navya ⲹ took the matter seriously and made remarkable contribution in the study of language. For them, sentence is the collection of words and sentence-meaning is the collection of word-meanings. Ś岹ǻ is the term they use to represent the cognition of the meaning of a sentence. It is already discussed that ⾱첹 also admit the theory of Աⲹ, with a slight difference from that of the ṭṭ School of īṃs, to explain the process of verbal cognition. Thus, the mutual connection between the word-meanings or ṃs is the sentencemeaning.
In 屹ī, վśٳ expounds the complete process of verbal cognition in a single verse:
貹岹ñԲԳٳ 첹ṇa� 屹� tatra padārthadhī� ś岹ǻ� � tatra śپdhī� sahakāriṇ�.
�(1988, p.546)
ܲṣi 첹 states that the meaning of a sentence consists in the mutual relation of the meanings expressed by the words:
According to īś, sentence-meaning is the mutual relation of word-meanings, and in this relation, one meaning is correlated with another (Ś岹śپś, 2002, p.22). Thus, it is obvious that almost all scholars in the School of ⲹ accept the mutual relation of wordmeanings as the sentence-meaning. It must be noted that, according to this philosophy, sentence-meaning is not to be taken as the primary or secondary meanings of a sentence. It is because this school does not accept either the primary significatory power (śپ) or the secondary one (ṣaṇ�) in a sentence. To the ⾱첹, word is the meaningful unit of language and they express their primary meaning through śپ. Śپ is the will of God, which determines the meaning of the word:
"asmāt padādayamartho boddhavya itīśvarecchā śپ�",
�(ղ첹ṅg, 1971, p.151).
Navya ⾱첹 describe śپ as the will of the speaker, which assigns the meaning to the word.
Though the ancient works of the ⲹ School did not emphasize on the discussions related with language studies, later texts like Ś岹śپś, ղܳٱ貹ٳپ岹, ⲹmañjarī, ṣārٲԲ etc. give special stress on ⾱첹's view about the complex phenomenon of verbal cognition. In the ⲹ tradition, Jayanta, the author of ⲹñᲹī, was the first, who elaborately discuss the concept of sentence-meaning. In this work, he discussed the theories of verbal comprehension in detail.
He refers to diverse views held by the preceptors:
"tatra vipratipattiśca ܰū 貹ś峾",
�(1970, p.300),
And rejects all these views.
Besides, he also refutes the Grammarians' theory of ʰپ, ԱԲ岹 and Աⲹvāda (1970, p.335). After rejecting all these views, Jayanta introduces a unique idea about the cognition of sentence-meaning, known as ' ٱ貹ⲹ岹'. According to him, the word ٱ貹ⲹ signifies the power of word which conveys the related meaning of the words in a sentence. Thus Jayanta states that ٱ貹ⲹ is the cause of the cognition of sentence meaning. In Navya ⲹ, this power of words is called 'ṃsmaryādā'. In the School of Navya ⲹ, this term refers to the syntactic expectancy of words (ṅkṣ�).
Gadādharabhaṭṭa remarks that the meaning of a sentence, which is the relation that exists among the individual meanings of the words, is put forth by the ṃsmaryādā or the syntactic expectancy:
"ekapadārthe' parapadārthasya ṃs� ṃsmaryādayā bhāsate",
�(ղܳٱ貹ٳپ岹, 1973, p.1).
Thus ⾱첹 reject all the different views regarding the verbal comprehension of a sentence presented by the other systems such as Grammar, īṃs etc. They maintain that the verb in a sentence is not important, but the nominative substantive (ٳԳٳ) is the primary substantive (ܰⲹśṣy) in the sentence. All the remaining parts in a sentence are the qualifiers of that word[1].
Footnotes and references:
[1]:
This view if Nayayikas will be explained later under 2.5.2