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THE ADYAR LIBRARY BULLETIN
to be more precise, that what alone counted with regard to an action's falling under himsā or ahimsā was according to him nothing but the question whether the plant forming its object is still alive or already dead: What I have in mind is the passage II 176. 7f. where it is asked with regard to vārtt. 2 on Pāṇ. 3. 4. 37: asti punar ayam kvacid dhantir ahimsārthaḥ yadartho vidhiḥ syāts, but is this [root] han ever used as denoting non-injury so that a prescription is needed for it (i.e to safeguard the formation of the absolutive in -am)? '; and the answer is: astity äha | pānyupaghātam vedim hanti, 'I say yes, it is in fact [used in this sense, too, e.g. if it is said] “He strikes the vedi (i.e. he makes it flat and firm) by striking with the hand upon it".' The editors of the NSP edition of the Bh. are perfectly right in explaining in a foot-note (III 266 b) prānaviyogānukūlavyāpāro hi hiņsā, sā ca vedyām nāstīti bhāvaḥ; but they could have added that the action denoted by han does not, in the present case, constitute an act of himsā because the Kusa grass which is strewn over the vedi is already dead since it was plucked, and this action of injury is over.78
As for the counter example given by Patañjali in his discussion of Pāṇ. 1. 4. 52, it cannot but be realized that the fact that eating is an act of himsā, has nothing to do with its particular object, the barley plants. However, one should also not lose sight of the fact that the question of the ethical evaluation of this act of himsā does not arise at all, or rather is by no means in the foreground. What Patañjali wanted to do was to adduce convincing and clear examples for the use of the
