History of Dharmashastra (Ancient and Mediaeval Religious and Civil Law in India) v7.c93.479

v7.c93.479

Let us now turn to the interpretation of *vākya* (sentence). The Ṛgveda and the Sāmaveda are metrical and therefore there is generally no difficulty in arriving at what constitutes in them one syntactical unit (vākya). But much of the Kṛṣṇa Yajurveda is in prose Therefore, PMS (II. 1. 46) defines²¹²² what makes one vākya by stating that when a number of words serve a single purpose, but if one or a few of those words are separated from the rest, the latter words are incomplete in effecting a purpose and stand in need of the words separated, then all these words make one vākya. An example is the mantra 'I offer thee, that art dear to Agni, at the command of God Savitṛ with the arms of Aśvins, with the hands of Pūṣan'. This is one sentence, the purpose of which is nirvāpa (offering). For other definitions of *vākya*, vide the author's notes on Sāhityadarpaṇa (II. 1) p. 34. For constituting words into a sentence with an understandable meaning expectancy²¹²³ (ākāṅkṣā), compatibility (yogyatā) and proximity (sannidhi) are required, particularly the first. For example, Śaṅkarācārya on V.S.I. 4 3 says that without ākāṅkṣā there is no cognition one that should be performed for niṣāda-sthapati. A niṣāda is a person born of a brāhmaṇa father and śūdra mother (vide Manu X. 8). He does not belong to one of the three higher varṇas. Sthapati means 'chief or leader'. The question whether the compound word means 'a niṣāda who is a chief (that is a karmadhāraya compound) or whether it means 'the ruler of niṣādas' who may not necessarily be a niṣāda himself but may be a kṣatriya (i. e. whether one should take the word as 'ṣaṣṭhī-tatpuruṣa' as 'niṣādānām sthapatiḥ') The conclusion is that a karmadhāraya is more powerful than a tatpuruṣa, since in the former both the words may be directly connected with the verb (niṣādaścāsau sthapatiśca, tam yājayet). The V. M. makes use of this 'maxim'. The Śaunaka-smṛti authorizes śūdras to adopt a son, yet some writers like Rudradhara, author of Śuddhīviveka, held that adoption required a homa with mantras and as a śūdra could not repeat vedic mantras he could not adopt. To this V. M. replies that his power to adopt a son being established by Śaunaka's smṛti all that is required is that he may get the homa performed through a brāhmaṇa. The Bhāmatī on Śaṅkarā's bhāṣya on V. S I. 3. 15, where the meaning of the word 'brahmaloka' in Chāndogya-Up. VIII. 3. 2 is in question, says that the niṣādasthapatinyāya applies and so 'brahmaloka' means 'brahma as the goal' and not 'the world of brahma.' Manu XI. 54 enumerates five Mahāpātakas (deadly sins), one of which is 'gurvaṅganāgama' (sexual intercourse with gurvaṅganā). Commentators have differed about the meaning of this word, some like Bhavadeva in Prāyaścittaprakaraṇa stating that, following niṣādasthapatinyāya, the word must be dissolved as a Karmadhāraya compound (guruḥ or gurvī cāsau aṅganā ca), the meaning being one's own mother, while many others dissolve it as a tatpuruṣa compound meaning 'guror or gurūṇām aṅganā' (which would then .include a step-mother, an elder brother's wife and teacher's wife &c.). Vide H. of Dh. vol. III. pp. 23-25 for a discussion of this.