Vakyapadiya of Bhartrihari
by K. A. Subramania Iyer | 1965 | 391,768 words
The English translation of the Vakyapadiya by Bhartrihari including commentary extracts and notes. The Vakyapadiya is an ancient Sanskrit text dealing with the philosophy of language. Bhartrhari authored this book in three parts and propounds his theory of Sphotavada (sphota-vada) which understands language as consisting of bursts of sounds conveyi...
This book contains Sanskrit text which you should never take for granted as transcription mistakes are always possible. Always confer with the final source and/or manuscript.
Verse 3.14.178
Sanskrit text, Unicode transliteration and English translation of verse 3.14.178:
जातिश्चेत् स्त्रीत्वमेवासौ भेदोऽन्यत्राविवक्षितः ।
यस्माद् भिन्नैरपि द्रव्यैस्तदेकं सद् विशिष्यते ॥ १७८ ॥jātiścet strītvamevāsau bhedo'nyatrāvivakṣitaḥ |
yasmād bhinnairapi dravyaistadekaṃ sad viśiṣyate || 178 ||178. If the femininity (conveyed by the suffix) is a universal, then (that being the main meaning) the differentiation found elsewhere (that is, in the individuals) is not meant to be conveyed. Therefore, the one universal is qualified by the multiple individuals.
Commentary
[It might be said that femininity is a universal which presupposes a substratum and even though the suffix expresses the universal, the word takes a number according to the number of the substrata. But this is not right. It is the universal which is the meaning of the suffix and that being the main thing, the word should have the number of the universal, that is, the singular number.]
It is now stated that even by adopting the view that gender is the condition of the guṇas, the difficulty would not be overcome.