Some Observations On Manuscript Transmission Of Nyayabhasya

Author(s): Yasutaka Muroya
Publisher: Yasutaka Muroya

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Journal of Indological Studies, No. 18 (2006)
more, these testimonies do not affirm that the text of the NBh ends with nihśreyasādhigamah after bhāvāt.
As regards the supplementation of the sutra with nihśreyasādhigamah, Gambhīravamsaja's Nyāyasūtravivarana (hereafter NSV(G)), is worthy of our attention. 21 The ms. of the NSV(G) written in Grantha script reads tatuajñānād iti o duhkhajanmapraurttidosamitthyajñānānām uttarottarāp++++nantaräpāyāt* nisreyasādhigama iti tena sambandhah.22 The last phrases nihśreyasādhigama iti tena sambandhah may indicate that 1.1.2 should be connected with the last word of 1.1.1, i.e., nihśreyasādhigamaḥ.23 A further testimony for the reading in question, namely, nihśreyasādhigamaḥ in place of apavargah, is Akalanka's Tattvärthavarttika.24
How was the wording of 1.1.2 treated by the commentators on the NS in the medieval period, and how was the question of whether 1.1.2 ends with bhāvāt or apavargah discussed by them? Vācaspati Miśra I inserts a brief, noteworthy digression occasioned by anonymous opponents in the
apavargah in an appendix to his edition: "If the word apavargalh is employed subsequently to tadanantarābhāvāt in the first line of the commentary here, then the incoherence of the meaning (of 1.1.2) is removed" (iha vrtteh prathamāyām pamktau "adanantarabhāvāt" ity anantaram apavarga iti padam yadi yojyate tadarthasya visargatir apahrtā bhavati; cf. NTD parisistam (1), p. 1 under 1.1.2).
21 This text was first published in 1992 by Anandateertha V. Nagasampige. According to the editor, the author's date is unknown (cf. his preface to the NSV(G): xv-xvi); in the margalasloka, the work is called "Nyāyavärttikasamgraha" by the author himself. The NSV(G), or probably more correctly the Nyāyavārttikasamgraha, is rich in quotations from both the NBh and the NV.
22Cf. ORIML(4) f. lv 9-11. I take the reading provided by ORIML(4) as better than the text of the printed edition. This ms. was not utilized by the editor of the work, A. V. Nagasampige, although the presence of the ms. is noted in R. G. Mālagi's Introduction (prastāvanā); cf. his Introduction to the NSV(G): v, fn. 1. As for the basis of his printed edition (cf. his prārinivedanam "prior announcement"), Nagasampige has mentioned two mss. written in Grantha and Kannada scripts respectively, and preserved at the Oriental Research Institute, Mysore (mss. nos. P. 4071/B and A. 743/2 respectively; the former is a palm-leaf ms.). Cf. also R. S. Shivaganesha Murthy's Preface to the NSV(G) (p. ii), which states that the edition is based upon a single ms., most probably the former one.
As for the reading of the printed edition, cf. NSV(G) 8,10-13, which, probably on the basis of the ms. mentioned above, reads: duḥkhajanmapraurttidosamithyajñananām uttarottarāpāye tadanantarābhāvät, nihśreyasādhigama iti sütrena gatena sambandhah. I find it difficult to construe nihśreyasadhigama iti sütrena gatena sambandhah, which may literally be understood as "a connection (of 1.1.2) with the elapsed sutra (running) 'the attainment of the highest good' (should be effected)."
Cf. NS 1.1.1: pramānaprameyasamsayaprayojanadrstāntasiddhāntāvayavatarkarirnayavādajalpavitandāhetvābhāsacchalajātinigrahasthānānām tattvajñanan niņśreyasādhigamah (cf. Ep 2,7-9).
24 Cf. TAV 12,8-9: duhkhajanmaprausttidoşamithyajiananám uttarottarapaye tadanantarābhāvān ninfreyasādhigama ity anyesām darśanam. Akalanka's reference to "the view of others" (anyesäm darśanam) does not make clear whether this view is concerned with the sutra only, or whether it relates to its text as embedded in the NBh. Obviously he does not presuppose the commonly accepted text of 1.1.2. A further independent testimony is ASTV II 628,2-3, which runs yad uktam parena duhkhao ... tadanantarabhāvan nisreyasa iti (ellipsis by me). I owe this reference to Mr. Himal Trikha, M.A.