Sambodhi 1977 Vol 06

Author(s): Dalsukh Malvania, H C Bhayani, Nagin J Shah
Publisher: L D Indology Ahmedabad

Page 58

Sż
Dr. Satya Vrat
use in the sense of desiring with the preposition 3712. If 3116 has no force, what is the rationale behind the precept 317 318 3-31814? Likewise the root 717 is powerless to denote the twin senses of respecting and seeing without the the help of 34 and a though it has full sanction of grammar. There is not a solitary instance in the whole range of literature where it is used in isolation of the above Upasargas. The conclusion is irresistible that Sanskrit prepostions are not altogether void of meanings and not unoften they lend them to the roots they join.
Traditionally prepositions are believed to discharge threefold functions viz. (i) sometimes they limit the sense of the root (ii) sometimes they strengthen it (iii) and at others they introduce no yelty in its meaning.
धात्वर्थ बाधते कश्चित्कश्चित्तमनुवर्तते ।
तमेव विशिनष्टयन्य उपसर्गगतिस्त्रिधा ॥ Upasargas in the works of Asvaghoşa do not follow this set pattern nor are they always found to adhere to any norm. Like most of his co-religionists he has gone off the track in the use of prepostions. Not un frequently his treatment is arbitrary. Like the author of the Bhagavata in his anxiety to sound pedantic at places, has given his language a fair sprinkling of the verbal forms which thoughi peculiar are hopeless and betray a pathetic disregard of tradition. As a consequence he is found using prepositions to denote the meaniugs that have nothing to commend them except their disdain for usage with the result they failed to muster currency and died almost with him.
Prepositions, as used by Agvaghosa, besides those that observe the norm and are a current coin and as such need no exposition can be classified into three broad categories. The first is represented by those upasargas which bring about no change in the primitive sense of the roots, though in subsequent literature they have definite denotations. The root 7 that has been used so extensively in Asvaghoşa's works as to encompass all the three categories provides brilliant illustration of how a root may remain unaffected in its meaning even in conjunction with prepositions which otherwise
usher sure changes in them. With Ašvaghoşa it undergoes no alteration even with ff and afa. The following instances deserve notice :
sangaliaa 278 fanzela i S. IX. 44,
38ffafafa maal aa: sfahNTHI B. XII. 83. Hare famaefà means nefa and afar is equivalent to m1h. The use of me with afa is unusual in this sense. It is also found used in a slightly different though equally unusual sense of 'dying' which seems to be an