Published online by Cambridge University Press: 24 December 2009
Since 1896, when I-ching's famous book on Buddhism in India and South East Asia was made available in an English translation by J. Takakusu, Western Sanskritists have looked with special interest at chapter xxxiv, on the Sanskrit grammarians. The general reaction has been one of disappointment; and for many years most Indologists would have agreed with many of A. Barth's criticisms: ‘Il demeure done bien acquis que, parmi des renseignements du plus grand prix, comme les dates de la Kāçikā Vṛitti et du grammairien Bhartṛihari, I-tsing nous a servi quelques bourdes énormes; par exemple, quand il fait du Mahābhāshya un commentaire sur la Kāçikā Vṛitti; quand il distingue entre le Vākyapadīya de Bhartṛihari et son commentaire sur le Mahābhāshya’; and more besides. Ironically, it is now known that the date given for Bhartṛhari is wrong, and that the latter did write both the Vākyapadīya and a commentary on the Mahābhāṣya. Nevertheless, other errors continue to be quoted.
1 Principal references
T Taishō shinshū Daizōkyō.
I-ching: Nan-hai chi-kuei nei-fa chuan , T, LIV, no. 2125.
Takakusu, J. [Junjirō, Takakusu] (transl.), A record of the Buddhist religion as practised in India and the Malay Archipelago (A.D. 671–695), by I-tsing, London, 1896Google Scholar; reprinted Delhi, 1966.
Gemmyō, Ono(Japanese transl.), in Kokuyaku Issaikyo, LXXXIVGoogle Scholar, Shiden-bu , Part 16, Tokyo, 1936Google Scholar, reprinted 1959.
Hsüan-tsang, : Ta T'ang hsi-yü chi T, Li, no. 2087Google Scholar.
Beal, S. (transl.), Si-yu-ki. Buddhist records of the western world…from the Chinese of Hiuen Tsiang, London, 1884Google Scholar; reprinted Delhi, 1969.
‘Biography’: Ta T'ang Ta tz'ŭ-en ssŭ san-tsang fa-shih chuan , by Hui-li, and Yen-ts'ung, , T, L, no. 2053Google Scholar.
Julien, Stanislas (transl.), Voyages des pèlerins bouddhistes, I, Histoire de la vie de Hiouenthsang el de ses voyages dans l'lnde, Paris, 1853Google Scholar.
Beal, S. (transl.), The life of Hiuen-Tsiang, London, 1888Google Scholar, reprinted 1911, 1914.
In the transcription of Middle Chinese, I have tried to follow in principle Pulleyblank, E. G., ‘The consonantal system of Old Chinese’, AM, NS, IX, 1, 1962, 58–144Google Scholar; IX, 2, 1963, 206–65. On the principle of economy, I have omitted the yod where it is implicit in the syllable, i.e., where no contrasting form without yod can exist. Oversight apart, other departures from Pulleyblank's notation are purely typographical, and self-explanatory.
2 In his review-article on Takakusu's, translation, Journal des Savants, 09 1898, 532Google Scholar.
3 On this, see also p. 259, n. 40, below.
4 This is not said to discredit the work as a whole, which was of great value at the time; and it must also be remembered that this translation was a very early work of the distinguished Japanese scholar who, during the remainder of a long life, contributed so much to Buddhist studies.
5 Section headings (which are in the original) are printed here as in Takakusu's book, except that for typographical convenience I have throughout modernized his transliteration of Sanskrit words.
6 van Gulik, R. H., Siddham, Nagpur, 1956Google Scholar; and most recently, Nagao, Gadjin M., ‘Siddham and its study in Japan’, Acta Asiatica (Tokyo), 21, 1971, 1–12Google Scholar.
7 Hsi-yü chi, T, Li, 876 c.
8 The term sung is conveniently used to translate śloka in both senses of the Sanskrit word, ‘metrical stanza’, and ‘a length of 32 syllables’ (in measuring the total extent of a prose work). I-ching, however, appears to have found it difficult to disentangle these two senses: a sung, he says, consists of four phrases, chü (pāda), each of eight syllables, tzŭ , thus giving a total of 32 syllables, yen . This, with his statement that there are also long and short ślokas, shows that he was thinking in terms of stanzas (Takakusu, 171–2; T, LIV, 228 b). Hsüan-tsang, , on the other hand, explains in one brief sentence that a sung consists of 32 syllables, yen (T, LI, 881c)Google Scholar.
9 T, L, 239 a.
10 T, L, 239 a; Beal, , Life, 122Google Scholar.
11 Vie, 166, quoted by Takakusu, , p. 172, nGoogle Scholar. Presumably Julien thought that the term referred to the case-endings (‘terminations’); but the Chinese word would be weird in such a sense.
12 The fact that the Aṣṭadhātu appears in the ‘Biography’ (T, L, 239 a; Beal, , Life, 122Google Scholar), not in the Hsi-yü chi, and is given 800 ślolcas, is not a serious stumbling-block. The compilers of the ‘Biography’ must have derived their information from Hsüan-tsang himself, and the agreement with I-ching guarantees the name Aṣṭadhātu. In many other respects, the ‘Biography’ shows much confusion. Thus, Pāṇini's grammar, ‘the work at present used in India’, is allocated 8,000 ślolcas, while a few sentences later an ‘abbreviated’ grammar in 1,000 ślolcas is mentioned. Such figures for the length of works are not to be taken too seriously. On the other hand, the Hsi-yü chi (T, LI, 881 c) states that Pāṇini, with the aid of Maheśvara, produced his grammar in 1,000 ślokas, thus agreeing with I-ching's figure. Takakusu (p. 172, n.) calculated the length of Pāṇini's Sanskrit text at about 956 ślolcas.
13 Pāṇini 1.4.10–12.
14 The italics in the last phrase presumably indicate doubt on Takakusu's part. In a footnote (p.174) he adds, ‘We should expect here “Ātmanepada and Parasmaipada”. “This and that” may be a vague way of expressing the grammatical terms “Ātmane” and “Parasmai”, for Chinese has no grammatical terms for these. Still, “worthy and unworthy” is very strange’. It should also be remarked that, while Takakusu is certainly correct in giving uttama, madhyama, and prathama as the three persons of the verb in I-ohing's intention (cf. Pāṇ. 1.4.105–8), it is not strictly true to say ‘literally’. In fact, I-ching has mistranslated uttama as ‘upper’ (instead of ‘last’), and has consequently been led to balance this by ‘lower’ for prathama (literally ‘first’, but corresponding to the third person in European terminology).
15 Shinkō, Mochizuki, Bukkyō daijiten, v, 4288cGoogle Scholar, s.v. bikara-ron: ‘manda…or gaṇapāṭha’. In III, 2778 c, s.v. shōmyō , however, he gives only ‘maṇḍa or muṇḍa’. In both entries, he relies mainly on I-ching and Hsüan-tsang, and in the article shōmyō quotes in Japanese translation a part of the present chapter from I-ching.
16 As is shown by the Chinese -ṣi- instead of -śi-, this is a compromise between a possible Gāndhārī form *muṃjuṣi and the Sanskrit -śrī. G ṣ < śr is well known: Gāndhārī Dharmapada, p. 103. For the first part of the name, cf. the alternation miṃjukrita, muṃjukrita, both probably for manju-: ibid., p. 84; CII, II, pp. 98–9. Khotanese hasmaṃjuśrī, mijāsūrī, and other spellings: Bailey, H. W., BSOAS, X, 4, 1942, 910Google Scholar. The Sogdian evidence is secondary, being translated from the Chinese, but reflects -u- in Chinese for the Prakritic form by mwnč(w)šry beside mnč'w-: MacKenzie, D. N., ‘Buddhist terminology in Sogdian: a glossary’, AM, NS, XVII, 1, 1971, 50, 51Google Scholar.
17 Pulleyblank, E. G., AM, NS, IX, 1, 1962, 81Google Scholar. Similarly the well-known (bḭuәt-dâ for buddha.
18 So transcribed by Julien, , Vie, 166, 470Google Scholar, and given by Takakusu, , p. 173, n., as ‘Maṇḍaka or Muṇḍaka or Mantaka’Google Scholar.
19 T, L, 239 a, where the first character appears as ((misprint, or corruption?), with a variant muən in a footnote. This last could have been the reading in the edition translated by Julien. Mochizuki, loc. cit., has .
20 On this unwritten nasalization, see the Sanskrit grammatical commentaries. The point is not relevant here. It is interesting (though doubtless not significant) that, apart from the present sūtra, Pāṇini normally uses the term upadeśa to refer only to the Dhātu-pāṭha: 8.4.14 and 18, etc.
21 The term vākya is often used instead of vārttika in Bhartṛhairs commentary on the Mahābhāṣya: see Kielhorn's edition, n, introd., p. 22, n. Whether or not the two terms are synonyms, or imply a contrast in type or in authorship, is a problem which I have not investigated.
22 edha vṛddhau is the first item in Dhātu-pāṭha I after bhū.
23 The reference is to vārttika 3 on Pāṇini 3.1.11 (Mbh., ed. Kielhorn, , II, 21Google Scholar), ācāre galbhaklība-hoḍebhyaḥ kvib vā.
24 In Böhtlingk's, edition, gaṇa 241, 28Google Scholar. Haradatta's apparently random choice of bhavat(u) is probably due to the rarity of vocalic it-elements in the Gaṇa-pāṭha.
25 There are a few exceptions, e.g., gaṇa 73 gavāśvaprabhṛtīni (neuter dvandvas), 242 savanādayaḥ. Feminine forms in -ā and -ī, although identical in shape with the nom. sg. fern., are to be understood also as stem-forms. Strictly, such feminines are not prātipadikas (Pāṇ. 4.1.1), but they are still stems (prakrti) before the case-endings are added; and by a jñādpaka from 4.1.1 they may reasonably be held to be included here under the title prātipadikapāṭha.
26 It is impossible to ascertain exactly what I-ching intended here by tzŭ-t'i . As noted above, p. 249, the ‘Biography’ of Hsüan-tsang at one point uses the term in the sense of akṣara, a character of the Sanskrit script. But a few lines later, the same text (T, L, 239 a) uses the same term several times in contrast to tzsystem-yüan . The latter is a good example of Hsüan-tsang's almost Tibetan-like attitude in the translation of technical terms: for yüan was already established as a translation of pratyaya ‘cause, etc’ in philosophical contexts. Thus Hsüan-tsang has boldly formed the compoundtzŭ-yüan to translate pratyaya ‘suffix’. The most probable sense for tzŭ-t'i in the ‘Biography’ would thus be prakṛti ‘word-stem’. If we accept Aṣṭadhātu as the name of Pāṇini's grammar, the description given there would then fit admirably: ‘In this (Aṣṭadhātu) (the author) briefly combines word-suffixes and word-stems’, i.e., the grammar gives ‘briefly’ [in sūtra-style] rules for the combination of stems and suffixes.
27 The word vṛkṣa occurs several times in the Gaṇa-pāṭha, but I-ching's account seems to make sense only in relation to the Uṇādi.
28 But perhaps a final -ya has been lost in th e transmission of the text.
29 Introduction to Takakusu's translation, p. xiv, where Kielhorn's remarks (see below, p. 256, n. 31) were referred to in a footnote, but obviously without understanding.
30 Deutsche Literaturzeitung, 1897, 532.
31 Mahābhāṣya, II, introd., p. 22, n. Hōbōgirin, s.v. bigara, while giving a useful collection of bibliographical references, renders the term vṛttisūtra as ‘les sūtra développés’; but this surprising translation is wide of the mark.
32 It need hardly be said that there is no reason to suppose that vṛttisūtra is a ‘back-formation’ from vārttika.
33 Chavannes, E., RHR, XXXV, 1897, 352Google Scholar, also doubted, but on somewhat different grounds: ‘…nous ne sommes pas tout à fait certains, si j'en crois les indianistes, que le Vṛtti-sûtra fût identique à la Kâçikâvṛtti, ni que, par conséquent, le Jayâditya mort en 661 ou 662 fût celui qui est parfois cité comme l'auteur de la Kâçikâvṛtti’. As an argument, this seems rather less than cogent; and it seems better to base any doubt upon I-ching's unpredictable reliability on any single point where we have no supporting evidence.
34 ‘Universe’ seems unnecessarily wide for huan-chung .
35 t'ien-jen is simply ‘gods’ here. It is possible that I-ching misread vaidikānāṃ as daivikānāṃ; but such a conjecture is unnecessary.
36 The reading of the second character requires justification. The Kuang-yün treats and as alternative forms. See also Pulleyblank, E. G., art. cit., 234Google Scholar; Gabelentz, , Chinesische Grammatik, § 404Google Scholar; Karlgren, , Analytic dictionary, nos. 13, 14Google Scholar; Morohashi, , Dai Kanwa jiten, I, nos. 470, 471, 1244Google Scholar. Thus is an alternative graph for . Morohashi, however, gives for all these three the kan-on reading ji. This would imply a Middle Chinese palatal initial ñ-, and presumably results from interchange with . The dental initial n- is nevertheless assured for by the Kuang-yün, which spells nәi'-li, hence ni'. The same character is used by I-ching for th e dental -ni in the name Pāṇini, pâ-ṇi-ni', while (probably by sheer accident of copying) Hsüan-tsang's text has transposed the last two syllables: Hsi-yü chi, T, LI, 881 c [emend to ] The ‘Biography’ has gone astray, and gives a retroflex in both syllables, T, L, 239 a pâ-ṇi'-ṇi. (This last character has the alternative reading nei', Karlgren, , ‘Grammata Serica recensa’, BMFEA, 29, 1957, 563Google Scholar; and in earlier transcriptions it seems to have been used not infrequently for Indian ni, especially in initial syllables. In later times, however, the normal contrast was made between nei for Skt. ni and for Skt. ṇi. It is thus improbable that the final syllable in the ‘Biography’ here can be interpreted as dentalni.)
37 Pischel, R., Grammatik der Prakrit-Sprachen, § 225Google Scholar; Hargovind Das Sheth, Pāia-saddamahaṇṇavo, giving cuṇṇia and cunnia, and similarly regularly throughout. The same fluctuation appears in words where -ṇṇ-:-nn- represents other conjuncts in Sanskrit.
38 Turner, R. L., CDIAL, 4889, 4897Google Scholar. In the sense of ‘lime-plaster’, Hi. cūn, cunā, Beng. cūṇ, cūṇā. The peripheral languages seem to have retained the retroflex nasal later than the more central languages, although in most, even where it is still written, it is no longer distinguished from the dental in pronunciation. Many other examples could be cited: ibid., 8339 pūrṇa-: Hi. pūn, Panjabi punnā.
39 Swaminathan, V. (ed.), Mahābhāṣya ṭikā by Bhartṛhari, I, Banaras, 1965Google Scholar. This contains āhnikas 1–4, and the remaining (incomplete) three āhnikas extant in the manuscript are promised for subsequent publication.
40 Biardeau, Madeleine has expressed some doubt about the authenticity of the surviving fragmentary commentary: Théorie de la connaissance et philosophie de la parole dans le brahmanisme classique, Paris, 1964, 261–2Google Scholar, although in the end she appears to leave the question open. But Swaminathan, V., ‘Bhartrhari's authorship of the commentary on the Mahābhāṣya’, Adyar Library Bulletin, XXVII, 1–4, 1963, 59 ffGoogle Scholar., has noted quotations or close paraphrases in Kaiyata's Pradīpa, Vardhamāna's Gaṇaratnamahodadhi, Saraṇadeva's Durghaṭavṛtti, Annambhaṭṭa's sub-commentary on Kaiyaṭa, and Nāgeśa's Uddyota (in the last, thrice hariṇā, and once hari-ṭikāyārn), all of which are ascribed to Bhartṛhari, and all of which appear in the extant commentary. Thus, from the eleventh century onwards, the latter was certainly considered to be the work of Bhartrhari; and there is no reason to doubt that it is the same commentary mentioned in the seventh century by I-ching. The onus of proof is thus on those who wish to ascribe the Mahābhāṣya-ṭikā to a different Bhartṛhari. Further, Mile. Biardeau writes (ibid., 258), ‘Le contenu des œuvres de Bhartṛhari tel qu'il nous est indiqué par I-tsing est quelque peu surprenant. D'une part, il évalue tout en śloka, même s'il s'agit d'un ouvrage en prose comme le commentaire sur leMahābhāṣya…’. This, at least, is not surprising, since from early times, as witnessed by countless manuscript colophons, prose works were regularly measured in ślokas ‘groups of 32 syllables’ (cf. p. 249, n. 8, above). On p. 259 she continues, ‘I-tsing fait état d'un commentaire sur le VP (e'est-à-dire sur les deux premiers kāṇḍa) qui aurait 7 000 śloka et serait l'œuvre de Bhartṛhari. Outre que nous ne possédons aucune glose versifiée du VP,…’; p. 260, ‘Ni l'une ni l'autre n'est versifiée’. One may argue on other grounds, as Mile. Biardeau herself has done in the introduction to her translation of Vākyapadīya i, that the commentary on that kāṇḍda ascribed to Bhartṛhari by Charudeva Shastri is by a different author; but the fact that it is not in verse is no argument. I-ching may still be telling the truth when he states that Bhartṛhari wrote a commentary (in prose, though I-ching had been given by his informants a measurement in ślokas) on Vākyapadīya i and ii. Naturally, even if this is true, it does not prove that any surviving commentary is Bhartṛhari's own.
41 As noted by V. S. Agrawala in his foreword to Swaminathan's edition of the commentary, Vardhamāna in his Gaṇaratnamahodadhi (mid twelfth century) refers to Bhartṛhari as the author of the Vākyapadīya, the Prakīrṇaka, and a commentary on the Māhdbhāṣya called Trīpddī. Thus, then as in I-ching's time, the Prakīrṇaka was still considered as a separate work.
42 lyengar, H. R. Rangaswamy, ‘Bhartṛhari and Diṇnāga’, JBBRAS, NS, XXVI, 2, 1951, 147–9Google Scholar; Nakamura, H., ‘Tibetan citations of Bhartṛhari's verses and the problem of his date’, Studies in Indology and Buddhology, presented in honour of Professor 8. Yamaguchi, Kyoto, 1955, 122–36Google Scholar; Frauwallner, E., ‘Dignāga, sein Werk und seine Entwicklung’, WZKSO, III, 1959, 83–164, especially 146–52Google Scholar. On Bhartṛhari and Buddhism (now really a dead issue), see further Ruegg, D. S., Contributions à l'histoire de la philosophie linguistique indienne, Paris, 1959, 57 ffGoogle Scholar., with detailed references to previous discussions.
43 W[atters, T.], JRAS, 1897, 363Google Scholar.
44 cf. Burrow, T., ‘Spontaneous cerebrals in Sanskrit’, BSOAS, XXXIV, 3, 1971, 538–59CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
45 It is a pity that Bühler's suggestion, that the Indian word intended here wasbeḍa or veḍa ‘boat’, was adopted by Takakusu, and has been too often repeated.
46 op. cit., 147.
47 Iyer, K. A. Subramania, Bhartḍhari: a study of the Vākyapadīya in the light of the ancient commentaries, Poona, 1969, 6Google Scholar.