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CHAPTER X
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tion severally paid to the manifold features in the situation. concerned. This fact introduces a sequential outlet (kramarpana) for what would otherwise remain a 'paradoxically objectionable' position. In other words, if the mode of avaktavya were an absolute position (sarvathaikāntadṛṣṭi) it would certainly be 'a paradoxically objectionable' position, but since the mode represents a relative position (kathañcidekäntadṛṣṭi) it leaves room for a sequential alternative which guarantees a gradual unfoldment of the entire complex structure of the factual situation in hand.
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Words have a vital role to play in the process of the unfoldment of the complex or the simple meanings of reality in spite of their limitations as noticed under the 'inexpressible" (avaktavya) mode. Communication of the meanings of reality either to us (svärthaḥ) or from us to others (pararthaḥ) is said to be an inherent power (svabhäviki śaktih) in words. Devabhadra, for instance, observes that every specific meaning is resident in a particular
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1. Referring to this śaktiḥ or yogyata Prabhācandra observes: yogyata hi sabdarthayoḥ pratipadyapratipädakaśaktiḥ, jñānajñeyayor jñāpyajnapakaśaktivat/ NKC, Vol. II, p. 538. See also PKM, p. 428, where also he writes to the same effect when commenting on the following Parikṣāmukha sutra: sahajayogyatā sanketavaśāddhi sabdadayaḥ vastupratipattihetavaḥ/ Ibid., p. 427. (Here 'sabdadayaḥ', or words etc., means words, gestures made by fingers, etc. (angulyadivakya) and any similar signs.) In NKC, Vol. II, p. 541, the same writer again observes: saktis tu svābhāviki yathā rūpaprakāśane cakṣurādeḥ tatha arthaprakāśane sabdasyapi/ Vadideva also makes similar observations on this question. See SRK, pp. 702-3. A brief comment of Kumārila also is of interest in this connection: sarvo hi sabdo'rthapratyayanärtham prayujyate (Tantravärtika, I. 3. 8).
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