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Slokavartika-a study
actually taken place here; for here we are only being told that there are cases when the word which is usually found in the form dadhi assumes the form dadhya (vv. 20110). Lastly, Kumārila considers the objection that a word appears as loud or slow according as the means employed are more powerful of less but such a thing is possible only in case the means in question are a means of causation and not just a means of manifestation (vv. 210-21). His reply is that neither a letter nor a wordmade-up-of-letters assumes a different form when different means are employed to make it manifest; on his showing, what does happen is that the manifestation is more powerful when the means employed is more powerful, it is less powerful when the means employed is less powerful. The point has been made clear with the help of a few illustrations. Thus the face reflected in a big mirror appears big, the same reflected in a small mirror appears small; and the reflection retains the same form in both cases (vv. 216). Again, when sky covered by a big mass of earth or water is made manifest the manifestation is big, when the same covered by a small mass is made manifest the manifestation is small, but in neither case is sky produced (vv. 217-18). Lastly, a jar is made manifest more powerfully by a more powerful light and less powerfully by a less powerful light, but it remains the same jar in both cases (vv. 219-20). Here ends Kumärila's defence of the eternal character of a word based on major ontological considerations. But before taking leave of the topic he raises a new. point (vv. 221-28). We have seen that according to Kumārila sabda is a generic entity whose two subspecies are letter and word. This means that a tolerably correct translation of the word 'sabda' will de articulate sound. But we have also found Kumārila saying that 'Jabda' is what is an object of auditory perception. This means that this classification is anomalous in that it makes no room for inarticulate sound which too is an object of auditary perception. So Kumarila now offers three alternative views of what an inarticulate sound (e.g. the sound made by a conch-shell) should be (i) On one view, a dhvani which is of the form of air-vibration is what constitutes inarticulate sound--so that when employed to make manifest a letter it is heard along with an articulate sound, when not so employed it is heard alone (vv. 223-24). The difficulty with this view is that it makes a property of air an object of auditory perception (2) On another view, a dhvani when produced by a particular vocal organ makes manifest a particular letter, when produced otherwise it makes manifest all the letters taken together (vv. 224-28). The difficulty with this view is that it fails to account for the variety of inarticulate sounds. (3) On the third view, inarticulate sounds are a third sub-species of labda (v.228). Logically, this view implies that all sorts of inarticulate sounds exist in an unmanifested form always and everywhere just as all the letters exist in an unmanifested form always and everywhere.
(ii) (vv. 229-77)
In this part of his text Kumārila argues that if a word be not an eternal entity then all talk of there being a relation between it and its meaning will turn out to
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