[Advaita-l] Theory of Language: Mimamsa, Advaita and Vyakarana 3 of 3

[H S Chandramouli]

Sri Siva Senani Ji,

As a clarification to my earlier post, when it is said " being the entity
seen as three " , do the three enjoy the same level of Reality as Brahman
or do they enjoy a different level of Reality ?

Regards

Chandramouli

On Sun, Dec 13, 2015 at 12:25 PM, H S Chandramouli <hschandramouli at gmail.com
> wrote:

> Sri Siva Senani Ji,
>
> You observed   << according to vyAkaraNa, Sabda, artha and their
> saMbandha - all three are nitya, with Brahman of the nature of Sabda being
> the base, or being the entity seen as three. >>.
>
> What exactly is the difference between the Brahman of Advaita and Shabda
> of Vyakarana ?? Is Shabda a Dharma of Brahman or nondifferent from Brahman ?
>
> Regards
>
> On Fri, Dec 11, 2015 at 9:59 PM, Siva Senani Nori via Advaita-l <
> advaita-l at lists.advaita-vedanta.org> wrote:
>
>> Sri Venkatraghavan ji
>> Namaste.
>> Thank you for initiating the discussion. My response is given inline.
>>
>>       From: Venkatraghavan S <agnimile at gmail.com>
>>  To: A discussion group for Advaita Vedanta <
>> advaita-l at lists.advaita-vedanta.org>; Siva Senani Nori <
>> sivasenani at yahoo.com>
>>  Sent: Friday, 11 December 2015 7:45 PM
>>  Subject: Re: [Advaita-l] Theory of Language: Mimamsa, Advaita and
>> Vyakarana 3 of 3
>>
>> Sri Siva SenAniji,
>> Namaste.Thank you very much for making these posts available to the group
>> - they were very enlightening indeed. Apologies about the barrage of
>> questions (please ignore, if I have not understood the concepts outlined by
>> you):1) If the vaiyAkaraNa considers sabda to be nitya, but that the artha
>> denoted by the sabda to be only conceptual, does that concept have
>> nityatvam or not?
>> - the conceptual artha is nitya.
>> 2) If the conceptual meaning of the word has nityatvam, then it follows
>> that arthA according to vyAkaraNa will have to survive praLaya, etc. If it
>> did not survive praLaya, how can the artha be nitya?
>> - yes, concepts survive pralaya.
>> 3) If such an artha did survive praLaya, how is the concept different
>> from mImAmsa's jAti?
>> - jAti cannot exist by itself and needs the ASraya of a vyakti. For
>> instance, where is cowness? It is there only in cows and nowhere else. So
>> after pralaya and before SRshTi, when nothing is, where does jAti reside?
>> The situation with concept is different. The conceiver, the conceived and
>> the concept are non-different; they are viewed as different during saMsAra.
>> Irrespective of how they are viewed, they always are. When we have
>> bheda-vivakshA (a desire to talk of them as separate, say as in "his
>> hands", and "the fingers of his hand"), they are referred to separately,
>> and when we have abheda-vivakshA (whether after pralaya and before sRshTi
>> or with reference to a jIvanmukta etc.), they are spoken of as one.
>> 4) If on the other hand, the vyAkaraNa position is that vyAkaraNa artha
>> is not nitya, then it follows that their relationship (betn. a nitya sabda
>> and its anitya artha) is not nitya. So when a vaiyAkaraNa says sabda is
>> nitya, is he only referring to sabda, but not its artha and sambandha?
>> - according to vyAkaraNa, Sabda, artha and their saMbandha - all three
>> are nitya, with Brahman of the nature of Sabda being the base, or being the
>> entity seen as three.
>> 5) Moreover, any specific sabda can then have several meanings, because
>> its artha is anitya. From srishti to srishti, or even within one srishti
>> itself, the same sabdA can denote different things. Extending this further,
>> is vyAkaraNa's position that veda sabda is nitya, but its artha keeps
>> changing?
>> - This is supposed to put the VaiyAkaraNa in a dock because nityatva
>> demands that the relation between Sabdas and Arthas should remain constant
>> through various kalpas, but there is a bhAshya statement to the contrary
>> [1], seemingly accepting Sabdanityatva limited to a kalpa, and stating that
>> artha is nitya across kalpas. The resolution is that bhAshykAra Patanjali
>> keeps toying in such a manner. Following the maxim, व्याख्यानात्
>> विशेषप्रतिपत्तिः, one should understand bhAshya statements with the help of
>> commentators. There are many places where Patanjali states many views
>> without indicating what the siddhAnta is. This is called perspectivism by
>> modern western scholars (i.e. accommodating multiple views to develop a
>> perspective), but traditional scholars identity certain positions as
>> siddhAnta, though there is no textual support. SiddhAnta is that the
>> relation is same across kalpas.
>> 6) Finally, is the nityatvam of sabda a paramArtha satyam in vyAkaraNa?
>> Or is it nityam only in a vyavahAra sense, like srishti/samsAra of an
>> advaitin? If paramArtha satyam, veda sabda will be paramArtham, but that is
>> not advaita's position (त्रैगुण्य विषयाः वेदाः).
>> - In the paramArtha Veda is non-different from Brahman; all Artha is
>> non-different from Sabda. That said, Veda  - presumably in its manifest
>> state - is explicitly accepted as an upAya (i.e. something which is no
>> longer useful after the goal is attained) in Vakyapadiya 1.5.
>> Once again, apologies about the many questions.
>> - Sir, on the contrary, you have my gratitude for raising the questions.
>> Hopefully, the answers help take the discussion forward.
>>
>> RegardsN. Siva Senani
>> [1] This occurs in the bhAshya under the sUtra तेन प्रोक्तम् ॥4.3.101॥
>> This sUtra states that taddhita affixes, taught in subsequent sUtras, occur
>> in the sense of tena proktam, i.e. prakarsheNa uktam. For instance on the
>> strength of 4.3.102, the taddhita affix छण् is ordained after tittiri when
>> the intended sense is tena proktam, i.e. तित्तिरिणा प्रोक्तम् अधीयते
>> तैत्तिरीयाः। This sUtra starts a discussion on the difference between
>> प्रोक्तम् and कृतम् (there is one more similar category called उपज्ञातम्,
>> but then we are digressing too much). One difference shown is that Veda
>> being nitya cannot be kRtam, and has to be proktam. In that context,
>> Patanjali makes the following statement:
>> ननु चोक्तं, न हि छन्दांसि क्रियन्ते नित्यानि छन्दांसीति। यद्यप्यर्थो
>> नित्यः, या त्वसौ वर्णानुपूर्वी सा अनित्या, तद्भेदाच्चैतद्भवति काठकं कालापकं
>> मोदकं पैप्पलादकमिति।It has been said that Vedas are not made, that they are
>> nitya. Even though the artha of Veda is nitya, the order of letters is not;
>> on account of the difference in the order of varNas, the same Veda is
>> called by various names such as kAThakam, kAlApakam, modakam and
>> paippalAdakam.
>>
>>
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