[Advaita-l] sabda nityatva vAda...a query

[Raghav Kumar]

Namaste Sriram ji
The vR^itti supposed to be by bhartRhari himself seems to imply that
shabdatattvaM is unchanging i.e., it is vivarta kAraNam of everything
; it is not pariNAmI.  It appears to me that the word shabdatattvaM
means shabdasya-tattvaM i.e., the essence of sabda.  There is a small
article in pdf format which may be useful ; it is @
 http://www.advaitin.net/ananda/vakyapadiyaexcerpts.pdf

I quote a few relevant portions with a some changes -
First shloka from vAkyapadIya of bhartRhari -
> anAdinidhanaM brahma sabdatattvaM yadakSharaM
> vivartatE(a)rthabhAvEna prakriyA jagatO yataH

The changeless essence of the Word is all there is. It has no
beginning nor does it come to end   It manifests (as though
transformed ) through the aims and objects (of the world) , as they
come to be ; from it proceeds the changing world.
 (words in brackets are mine)

The vR^itti for the shloka quoted by you is :

vidya-avidya-pravibhAga-rUpam,  apravibhagam
Its form appears to manifest through the distinction of knowledge and
ignorance.
But in itself, just as it is, there’s no distinction to be found

sthiti-pravrtti-nivrtti-vibhAgA shabdena akriyanta
>From shabda are formed the divisions of steadiness, activity and inactivity

tac ca  aksara-nimittatvad aksaram ity ucyate .
 But that itself remains unchanged. because of its continuing
causality, it is called ‘aksara’ or ‘that which does not change’.

(Here the word akshara-nimittattvAt akSharam seems to imply that the
sabdatattvaM always remains as the unchanging cause. It does not in
reality transform in to the effect.Its nimittatvaM (kAraNatvaM) is
akSharam (immutable).  In other words it is a vivarta-kAraNam.)

I have a question for you and other interested members -
1. Is bhartRhari accepted as an advaitin in the shAnkara tradition ?
Senani ji said yes.
2. Does BhartRhari accept sphotavAda ; bhAshyakAra denies it in BSB
devatAdhikaraNam ? 3. The vAkyapadiyA talks of only 3 level of vAc ;
how do we redress the question of the non-mention of parA vAc ?
4. Are there other references to sabda-brahman in Sankara-bhAShya or
other standard vedanta literature of SrI vAcaspati mishra, SrI
sureshvara etc ?
 Ok please make that 4 questions...
In my present state of understanding, it appears there is nothing
wrong with the sadba-brahman unfoldment of bhartRhari etc. But I am
not sure how the sticking points like the denial of sphotavAda by
Bhagavan Upavarsha and seconded by bhAShyakAra etc is to be reconciled
with the grammarian prakriyA of unfolding Brahman which is otherwise
quite remarkable.

Thanking you in advance
Om
Raghav

On Wed, Oct 12, 2011 at 6:50 PM, Venkata sriram P
<venkatasriramp at yahoo.in> wrote:
>
> Namaste Dear Members,
>
> There is a sloka from bhartruhari’s vAkyapadIyaM which says:
>
> ////
>

>
> //
>
> The above verse determines the eternality of the sabda-brahma
> ie., nityatva of sabda-brahma.  This also states that sabda-brahma
> is both kArya & kAraNa
>
> To support the above statement, the reference “sabdabrahmaNi niShNAtaH
> parabrahma adhigacchati” is cited.
>
> Does this sabda-nityatva vAda of vAkyapadiyaM supports
> vivartavAda or pariNAmavAda?
>
> Kindly explain.
>
> Regs,
> Sriram
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