Further References To Vaisesika Sutra In Patanjala Yogasastra Vivarana

Author(s): A Wezler
Publisher: A Wezler

Page 9

R. N. Dandekar Felicitation Volume For, regarding the shadow argument' as attested in this verse, one cannot but refer to what FRAUWALLNER has said about the difficulties the old nature philosophers were faced with, 48 viz. : "One could not, in a natural manner, explain shadow to be a form of one of the known elements. Such an explanation was also excluded because of the old popular view that shadow is something substantial." Instead of popular" or, perhaps in addition to it, FRAUWALLNER might have said "magical". In contradistinction to this archaic view, the shadow argument' as brought forward in the PYSV gives the impression of being quite rationalistic; and this not so much because in this connection, too, the author refers to empirical facts only, i.e. natural phenomena, known to everybody or at least easily verifiable, but rather because his argument is distinctly different from that adduced in the anonymous verse in that the Vivaranakara (just as the Jaina Gunaratna )*? does not seem to have thought any longer, at least not primarily, of the shadow of man as forming an essential part of any human being. 46. As Bedekar's translation (p. 20) is in this case (too) not faithful to the original (p. 38), I give my own English rendering here. 47. Cf. Tarkarahasyadi pika on Saddarsanasamuccaya, verse 49 (ed. Dr. Mahendra Kumar Jain ( Jnanapitha Murtidevi Jainagranthamala : Sanskrit Grantha No. 36 ) Benares 1969, p. 267 f.).