Vakyapadiya (study of the concept of Sentence)
by Sarath P. Nath | 2018 | 36,088 words
This page relates 鈥楽yntactic and Semantic thoughts in India鈥� of the study on Vakyapadiya by Bhartrhari and his treatment of the Concept of Sentence in Language. Bhartrhari was a great grammarian and philosopher who explored the depth and breadth of Sanskrit grammar. These pages analyse the concepts and discussions on sentence and sentence-meaning presented in the Vakyapadiya, against the different systems of knowledge prevalent in ancient India (such as Mimamsa, Nyaya and Vyakarana).
4. Syntactic and Semantic thoughts in India
One of the fundamental aspects of the philosophy of language, that has attracted the serious attention of all thinkers, is the relation between 艣补产诲补 (the linguistic element) and its meaning (artha). The term 艣补产诲补 is normally used to refer to a linguistic element, which is the meaningful unit of speech. Philosophers held different views on the linguistic element that is referred to by the term 艣补产诲补. According to various systems, it is the articulated sound or the phoneme (惫补谤峁嘺) or the word (pada) or the sentence (惫腻办测补). 惭墨尘腻峁僺补办补蝉 consider the letters or phonemes as 艣补产诲补, which are eternal. Words and sentences are only the manifestations of these phonemes. For the 狈补颈测腻测颈办补蝉, the term 艣补产诲补 refers to the word which is produced by the speaker and heard by the listener. Therefore, 艣补产诲补 is impermanent for them. According to the 厂辫丑辞峁璦 theory of grammarians, 艣补产诲补 is eternal, but not in the form of letters. To 叠丑补谤迟峁沨补谤颈, 艣补产诲补 is the complete utterance of the sentence and is the unit of language called 惫腻办测补spho峁璦 (Coward and Raja, 2008, p.5). Grammarians analyse the sentence also into morphemes for grammatical purpose, which are termed as 辫补诲补蝉辫丑辞峁璦 and 惫补谤峁嘺spho峁璦.