Sahrdayaloka Part 02

Author(s): Tapasvi Nandi
Publisher: L D Indology Ahmedabad

Page 38

593
"Vyañjanā' sphoța. Just as the soul remains unaffected by the qualities of the body such as fatness and the like, or just as the face is seen as though different when reflected in different objects such as oil, sword, etc., in the same way, though there is aupādhika-dhvani-bheda or difference in dhvani due to upadhis or external factors, sphoța is just one and identical. The point is that the grammarians take dhvani or word as the vyañjaka of sphoța. Thus according to them, dhvani may be difined as "dhvanatīti dhvanih”, i.e. it sounds, gives expression to sphoța, i.e. it rings, reverberates, suggests sphoța.
The writers on poetics extended the connotation of the word dhvani. They took the quality of dhvanitva, and included all that was related to this in dhvani. Thus, rīti, vrtci, guna, alamkāra, sabda, pada, padāmía, varna, vākya-racanā, kāvya, vyāpāra, etc. all this is placed in the fold of dhvani. When one meaning suggests another, it is also called a vyañjaka or a suggester. This suggester may be both the conventional meaning (i.e. vācya) and/or the indicated sense (laksyártha). Or, it may even be a vyangyártha, i.e. suggested sense, giving rise to a further suggested sense. Having regard to a karma-sādhana-vyutpatti of dhvani, even the mea that is suggested - vyajyamāna-artha' - is also called dhvani. And this becomes three-fold, such as vastu-dhvani, alamkāra-dhvani and rasā"di-dhvani. By bhāvasādhana-vyutpatti, the term dhvani would refer to the process of vyañjanā i.e. suggestion itself. Finally, the whole collection, called kāvya is also included in the comprehensive fold of dhvani. (See Locana on Dhv. I. 13, quoted above).
When it is said that the grammarians mean by dhvani those sound-units which become the object of hearing, the idea is that the word reaches the ear through krama-paramparā i.e. sequence, and the last sound-unit i.e. antima śabda-is caught by the ear. Thus, it is only the sabdaja-śabda that is heard by us. This is explained on the analogy of ghanță-nāda or the ringing of a bell. Bharthari puts it as follows - “yaḥ samyoga-vibhāgābhyām” ... etc. (as quoted in Locana on Dhv. I. 13). In view of the popular belief regarding both plurality and order (i.e. krama) of śabda, he makes his position absolutely clear by suggesting that no question of order such as priority and posteriority and that of plurality can be logically raised in relation to sphota which is essentially one and eternal. It is sound, he observes, that passes through successive stages in case of articulation and appears to be either long or short, in proportion to the exertion required for the utterance of a word. So, it is particularly due to varying modulations of voice, as caused by local apparatus, that 'ka' sound seams to be difference from 'kha' sound, and the like.