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Dissent among a Viśiṣṭādvaitin and a Mīmāṃsaka: What do Vedic words mean?

Within his Mīmāṃsā commentary, the Seśvaramīmāṃsā, Veṅkaṭanātha explicitly dissents from Śabara (also) in his commentary on Pūrva Mīmāṃsā Sūtra (henceforth PMS) 1.1.31 on Vedic words seemingly expressing proper names, e.g., Prāvāhaṇi and Babara (which are used by opponents as an evidence of the impermanent nature of the Vedas).

Śabara suggested that such seeming names in fact only express something else and offered alternative etymological explanations. Veṅkaṭanātha replies that out of context it is clear that specific people must be referred to, but that these people’s roles are recurrently covered at each new era.

The relevant passage by Śabara on PMS 1.1.31 reads:

[The name] ”Prāvāhaṇi” derives from `flowing forth’ (pravah-). [The name] ”Babara” imitates a sound. Therefore, these two [linguistic expressions] express only a permanent referent (artha). Therefore it is said \textbf{The other [ephemeral things mentioned in the Vedas], by contrast, are merely similar in the way they sound.

pravāhayati, sa prāvāhaṇiḥ. babara iti śabdānukṛtiḥ. tena yo nityārthas tam evaitau śabdau vadiṣyataḥ. ata uktam – paraṃ tu śrutisāmānyamātram iti

Veṅkaṭanātha’s rejection of this view reads as follows:

Only Half-Materialists (ardhacārvāka) like this construction (yojanā) [of the sūtra]. Otherwise, how could [such meanings] be connected (anvaya) with [linguistic expressions such as] ”he desired”? (How could ”Babara” be connected with ”he desired” if it is only an onomatopoeia?)

[Obj./in favour of Śabara:] Also in regard to that (”he desired”) one postulates a different meaning.

[R.:] Why should not [a different menaning] be postulated in this way in every case?

All four manuscripts of the Seśvaramīmāṃsā reproduce Śabara’s passage in a slightly different way, including a reference to vāyu as a referent of Prāvāhaṇi:

[The name] ”Prāvāhaṇi” derives from `flowing forth’ (pravah-). [The name] ”Babara” imitates a sound. Therefore, these two linguistic expressions express only a permanent referent (artha), [i.e.], the wind (which flows forth).

pravāhayati iti prāvāhaṇiḥ. babara iti śabdānukṛtiḥ. tena yo nityo ‘rthas tam imau śabdau vadiṣyataḥ vāyum. ata uktam – paraṃ tu śrutisāmānyamātram iti

The mention of vāyu is not present in the published version of the Śābarabhāṣya. Nonetheless, the reference to the wind is well-attested in the Mīmāṃsā subcommentaries on this adhikaraṇa, thus Veṅkaṭanātha could easily be aware of it.

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Did ṛṣis author the Veda? UPDATED

A Mīmāṃsā and Viśiṣṭādvaita Vedānta view about it

In his Seśvaramīmāṃsā (ad 1.1.29), Veṅkaṭanātha discusses the problem of the authorship of the Veda while being a Mīmāṃsaka, but also trying to condede something to theism.

For instance, he is less straightforward than Mīmāṃsā authors in ruling out the role of the ṛṣis. Mīmāṃsā authors spoke of the ṛṣis mentioned in connection with some Vedic parts as having just recited (and not authored) those parts in an excellent way. Veṅkaṭanātha does not deny his opponent’s claim that ṛṣis could see parts of the Veda they did not learn with a teacher. Nonetheless, they only see what they are eligible to see, through powers given to them by Prajāpati. They also don’t see anything new:

For this very reason, also the fact that the ṛṣis have done the sūtras, the [Vedic] parts (kāṇḍa) (Brāhmaṇa and Upaniṣads) and the mantras (i.e., the Vedic saṃhitās), conforms to previous acts (i.e., they have uttered them as they were in the previous kalpa), [and] the immediate perception (sākṣatkaraṇa) of a part of the Veda which has not been studied [by them] by ṛṣis who had specific powers given [to them] by Prajāpati conforms with their various eligibilities. For this reason, in this way there is no author of the Veda. Therefore, in all times the Vedas are only recited by a sequence (paramparā) of people depending on someone else (paratantra).

ata eva ṛṣīṇām sūtrakāṇḍamantrakṛttvam api prācīnakarmānuguṇaṃ prajāpatipradattaśaktiviśeṣāṇāṃ tattadadhikārānuguṇam anadhītavedabhāgasākṣātkaraṇam eva. tad evaṃ na vedakarteti sarvadā paratantrapuruṣaparamparādhītā eva vedāḥ.

In other words, ṛṣis are an exception to the normal transmission of the Veda, they are not at its origin. And they don’t see anything more than what people learn through their teachers.

Now a question to you, dear readers: I am not sure about my interpretation of the compound sūtrakāṇḍamantrakṛttvam. This is found in the same context also in Veṅkaṭanātha’s Nyāyapariśuddhi, but I could not find it in any other text. I am not sure about its meaning, since the Vedic kāṇḍas (karmakāṇḍa and jñānakāṇḍa) do include mantras. Nor did Veṅkaṭanātha mention here mantras of altogether different origin… Moreover, sūtras are generally accepted to have an author, so that they don’t really belong to the same group. What could be meant here?

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Being a Mīmāṃsaka and believing in God might be hard

To my knowledge, Veṅkaṭanātha’s Seśvaramīmāṃsā has been commented upon only once in Sanskrit, namely in the 20th c. by Abhinavadeśika Vīrarāghavācārya.
At times, the Sūkṣmārthaṭīkā‘s author seems to disagree with Veṅkaṭanātha insofar as he stresses that a certain position by the Mīmāṃsā school is “not accepted by us” (i.e., by the Viśiṣṭādvaita Vedāntins). Many such cases pertain to the core teachings about language and the Veda being fix according to Mīmāṃsā and depending on God according to Viśiṣṭādvaita Vedānta. In the commentary on SM ad PMS 1.1.29, the Sūkṣmārthaṭīkā is quite explicit:

By contrast, we do not accept the inference said by Mīmāṃsakas, namely ”Each recitation of the Veda has been preceded by one’s teacher’s teaching one the recitation of the Veda, because it is a Vedic recitation, like the present ones”. We do not accept it, because there is an exception, since the probans is absent in the recitation performed by Brahmā of the [Vedic text] based on the Lord (who was Brahmā’s inner controller, so that Brahmā did not need to learn the Veda from a teacher) as well as in the present recitation of the Veda, when it is performed by an ascetic who has made it present (and therefore can see it without the need of a teacher).
And we also do not accept the syllogism because it contradicts the sacred texts speaking of creation and dissolution [of the entire world].

vedādhyayanaṃ sarvaṃ gurvadhyapanapūrvakam adhyayanatvād ity anumānaṃ tu mīmāṃsakoktaṃ necchāmaḥ. īśvaramūlacaturmukhakartṛkādhyayane sākṣātkāritapasvikārite ādyādhyayane ca sādhyābhāvāt vyabhicārāt (ad SM ad 1.1.29, 1971 edition p. 128).

It is easy to see how a Mīmāṃsaka could not have agreed less with Vīrarāghavācārya’s arguments. Mīmāṃsā authors in general believe in a beginningless time and think that the idea of creations and dissolutions is only an unwarranted assumption. Even more dangerous is the idea that an ascetic might see directly the Veda, since this could open the door to yogipratyakṣa and to autonomous religious experiences.

In all the above ways, the Sūkṣmārthaṭīkā‘s author also indirectly points out the gigantic effort Veṅkaṭanātha undertook, almost seven centuries before, when he tried to propose a synthesis of Pūrva Mīmāṃsā and Vedānta.

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nitya and eternality

During the three days of this workshop on philosophy of language in South Asia I have been repeatedly asked why I would want to “remove” the aspect of eternality from the concept of nitya. In fact, I think the situation is rather the opposite.

“Eternality” is a later overinterpretation of a term which, in my opinion, originally did not mean that, and continued not to have eternality as its primary meaning throughout its history.

nitya (as shown by Minoru Hara, JAOS 79.2) is etymologically adjective meaning ‘inherent’. This meaning is completely in harmony with its use in the same semantic field as siddha, autpattika, apauruṣeya and svābhāvika in Vyākaraṇa and Mīmāṃsā, as well as dhruva.*

So, how comes that one starts speaking about temporality in connection with nitya? In my hypothesis, there are three steps:

  1. In connection with the Mīmāṃsā vs Nyāya controversy, Mīmāṃsā authors insist on the apauruṣeya aspect of language, whereas Nyāya authors insist on language as pauruṣeya. Since language is pauruṣeya, it is not nitya in the sense of being kṛtaka ‘made up’, ‘artificial’. Thus, once again, nitya is not opposed to ‘temporal’ but to ‘artificial’, once again pointing to an opposition which does not have “eternality” as its primary focus.
  2. The Mīmāṃsā vs Nyāya controversy evolved also into a Mīmāṃsā vs Buddhist Epistemology controversy. For Buddhist epistemologists, whatever is kṛtaka is also kṣaṇika. Here temporality comes into the picture. Still, the point is not about “eternality” vs, “temporality”, but rather about “fixed/permanent/ummovable” vs “ephemeral”, as shown by the examples mentioned (mountains and rivers are said to be respectively kūṭastha– and pravāhanitya).
  3. Euro-American interpreters are used to the topic of temporality and to the concept of eternality, which plays a big role in the Graeco-Roman and in the Judaeo-Christian worldviews. Thus, they are inclined to interpret concepts in this sense, just like it happens with concepts like “Scripture”, “God”, “letter” and the like, which have been introduced uncritically in the Indian debate.

*Yes, you might find nitya also in connection to anādi ‘beginningless’, which might be interpreted temporally (I rather think it just means “for which no beginning can be proved”). But this is just one among the many terms used in juxtaposition with nitya (see above for several others).

P.S. I recently wrote an article on nitya. You can read the pre-print version here.

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50th Annual Conference of the Society for Asian and Comparative Philosophy

This anniversary edition, hosted by the Pedagogical University of Krakow, will take place in Krakow (Cracow), Poland, June 8-11th 2018.

CONFERENCE THEME: Power and Creativity.

Keynote Speaker: Graham Parkes (University of Vienna), “Will to Power and the Field of Dao/De: Nietzsche and Zhuangzi on Creative Experience”.

Deadline for Abstracts and Panel Proposals: January 31, 2018.

Presentation and panel proposal abstracts should be sent electronically to the Secretary of the Society, Marzenna Jakubczak, atsacp2018@gmail.com. Abstracts for presentations should be between 200-300 words, and include a filename that begins with the presenter’s last name and closes with the name of our organization and the year of the conference, e.g., ‘Berger – SACP 2018’.

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The University of Heidelberg is searching for a lecturer in Tibetan

Please spread the word among interested and interesting candidates.

http://www.asia-europe.uni-heidelberg.de/en/about-us/jobs/detail/m/lecturer-in-tibetan-language.html

The University of Heidelberg invites applications for a full-time instructor in Tibetan language. The position is initially an eighteen-month appointment, and will begin on March 1, 2018. It is hosted by the professorship of Buddhist Studies, as part of the Heidelberg Centre for Transcultural Studies. The salary corresponds to level TV-L 13 of the German public service salary scale.

Applicants should have experience in teaching both classical and spoken Tibetan. Candidates must have a high level of knowledge of Tibetan, fluency in English, and teaching experience; and must hold at least a Master’s degree or higher in Tibetan language, literature, history, religious studies, or other related fields. Preference will be given to those with teaching experience at university level.

The lecturer will teach semester-length courses in both classical (literary) and colloquial Tibetan, to students ranging from undergraduate to PhD level. Aside from teaching, duties also include general service to Buddhist Studies and the Heidelberg Centre for Transcultural Studies, to which the lecturer is also expected to contribute with his or her own research interests.

Review of applications will begin on January 1, 2018. Applications will be accepted until the position is filled. The University of Heidelberg is an Equal Opportunity/Affirmative Action employer.

Required documents:
application letter, curriculum vitae, teaching evaluations (if available), and two letters of reference, as well copies of syllabi of courses taught or proposed. The documents should be sent to Ina Buchholz-Chebbi via e-mail and as a single PDF. Questions regarding the position should be sent to the same e-mail address: buchholz@asia-europe.uni-heidelberg.de

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“Linguistics in the premodern world? Just nonsense!”

Patrick O’Donnell, who also contributed to the Indian Philosophy blog, recently published an interesting response to the above argument, as found in this article by Gaston Dorren. Dorren’s main claim is:

While all disciplines attract the occasional eccentric, it seems that two fields exert a particularly strong pull: historiography and linguistics.

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Meanings of Words and Sentences in Mīmāṃsā

Mīmāṃsakas of both the Bhāṭṭa and the Prābhākara subschools refute the idea of a sphoṭa carrying the meaning and being different from what we experience, namely phonemes and words, since this contradicts the principle of parsimony and our common experience. Accordingly, they claim that phonemes really exist and that they together constitute words. They also subscribe to the idea that words convey word-meanings, and thus refute the Bhartṛharian holism, again because this idea is confirmed by common experience and common experience should be trusted unless there is a valid reason not to. In fact, human beings commonly experience that one needs to understand the words composing a sentence in order to understand its meaning.

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Viśiṣṭādvaitins speaking of Advaitins

The following passage is from Yāmuna’s Ātmasiddhi and it is a description of the Advaita position about the brahman as being tantamount to consciousness:

ato ‘syā na meyaḥ kaścid api dharmo ‘sti. ato nirdhūtanikhilabhedavikalpanirdharmaprakāśamātraikarasā kūṭasthanityā saṃvid evātmā paramātmā ca. yathāha yānubhūtir ajāmeyānantātmā iti. saiva ca vedāntavākyatātparyabhūmir iti (ĀS, pp. 29–30 of the 1942 edition)

Therefore this (consciousness) has no characteristic as its knowable content. Therefore, this very consciousness is eternal, uniform and it consists of light-only, without characteristics, in which all conceptualisations of difference have been dissolved. This consciousness alone is the self (ultimately identical with the single brahman, but illusory identified as one’s own self) and the supreme self (i.e., the brahman). As it has been said: ”That experience (i.e., consciousness) is unborn, cannot become a knowledge content, it is endless, it is the self”*. And this alone is the ultimate meaning (tātparya) of the Upaniṣads’ sentences.

The quote within the passage (yānubhūtir ajāmeyānantātmā) could be from Vimuktātman’s Iṣṭasiddhi (1.1: yānubhūtir ajāmeyānantānandātmavigrahā |
mahadādijaganmāyācitrabhittiṃ namāmi tām ||).*

Yāmuna’s description seems fair to me. Do readers more expert in Advaita agree?

*I am grateful to Anand Venkatkrishnan for his help in identifying this quote.

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Is anything at all understood out of false sentences?

Before answering that you do obviously understand something out of false sentences, too, consider that this would lead to:

—distinguishing between understanding the meaning of a sentence and knowing it to be true

—assuming a non-committal understanding of the meaning of a sentence

—understanding fitness as a requirement for the sentence meaning (yogyatā) as limited to the lack of obvious inconsistencies and not as regarding truth

—(possibly) assuming that the meaning of a sentence is not an entity out there (since there is no out-there entity in the case of false sentences), but rather a mental one

 

If you are now inclined to say that Indian authors on a whole could not answer yes to the question in the title, read the following sentence by Veṅkaṭanātha:

śaśaviṣāṇavākyād api bodho jāyata eva

Also out of the sentence claiming that hares have horns (e.g., out of an obviously false sentence), an awareness does indeed arise (SM ad 1.1.25, 1971 edition p. 114).