20-24 septembrie 2009 - Biblioteca Metropolitana Bucuresti

Śabdasaṃskāra, a mere grammatical technique?Florina Dobre-BratNational Pedagogical Library – BucharestThis paper does not refer strictly to the broad topic of myths and rituals,but it touches upon the aspects of purification and accomplishment thatgenerally pertain to rituals, applied to language and grammar, or rather asobserved by the philosophy of language.Thus, the aim of this paper is to shed more light on the expressionśabdasaṃskāra (word purification) which occurs a number of times in theBrahmakāṇḍa, the first part of the Trikāṇḍī work written by the 5 th centuryCE grammarian-philosopher Bhartṛhari.The place which Bhartṛhari gives to grammar as “the door tosalvation” (dvaram apavargasya Vākyapadīya (VP), I.14), “the best of allthe austerities, the one that is nearest to Brahman”(āsannam brahmaṇastasya tapasām uttamaṃ tapaḥ, VP I.11), makes him a remarkable figureof the Indian grammatical tradition. In the 5 th century CE, the grammarianphilosophersees the Supreme Reality in the form of World-Principle(śabda-tattva brahman) 1 , and that is the very premises of entrusting upongrammar a way to emancipation:This is the first step in the ladder leading to liberation; this is the straightroyal road for all those who desire salvation. 2Another outstanding reason for which the grammatical traditionrecords Bhartṛhari is that he bridges the gap which stretches over a fewcenturies of oblivion and decadence of genuine grammatical tradition1VP I.1: anādinidhanaṃ brahma śabdatattvaṃ yad akṣaram / vivartate’rthabhāvenaprakriyā jagato yataḥ //2VP I.16: idam ādyam padasthānaṃ siddhiṣopānaparvaṇām / iyaṃ sāmokṣamāṇānām ajihmā rājapaddhatiḥ // K.A. Subramanya Iyer's translation.