Volume 72, Issue 2 - Special Section: "Meanings out of Rules Definitions, Functions and Uses of paribhāṣās in Śrautasūtras, Gṛhyasūtras, Vyākaraṇa, Mīmāṃsā and Vedānta" Edited by Gianni Pellegrini

This article presents an overview of research on the corpus of eighteenth to twentieth century manuscripts from south of the Indus valley in Khojkī Sindhī script. After a general introduction to the significance of these manuscripts, we will first look at how researchers have approached the problem of the origins of the “Khojkī Sindhī” script and its relation to the religious tradition of the Khoja merchant caste of Sindh and Gujarat. Then, we systematically present the main cataloguing attempts and studies from 1964 onwards on the paleography, codicology, textual content and illustrations of these manuscripts. Finally, we summarize ongoing research and suggest new directions for future work on these manuscripts.

This paper engages with the literature of the Biśnoī Sampradāya, a religious tradition that emerged in the fifteenth century in Rajasthan and traces itself back to the Sant Jāmbhojī. The paper specifically examines a composition of the sixteenth-seventeenth century poet-saint and head of the tradition Vīlhojī. His Kathā Gyāncarī is a unique composition among the corpus of Biśnoi literature with regard to its genre, style and content. The text revolves around the consequences of one’s actions after death, particularly punishment in hell. This paper aims to illustrate that the Kathā Gyāncarī depicts suffering in hell as the eternal consequence of committing sins or crimes, which is unique not only for Biśnoī literature, but for Sant literature in general. It argues that the depiction of hell as eternal punishment was used as a rhetorical strategy at a time the Biśnoī Sampradāya faced intense difficulties. In another vein, this depiction of hell could indicate the Biśnoīs’ close connection to the Indian Shi’a community of the Nizārī Ismā’īlīs. This is reflected not only in the Kathā Gyāncarī ’s function of hell as a eternal punishment for disbelievers and sinners, but also in the soteriological role of the teacher or guru as well as in the appearance of various Nizārī figures and motives in the text. In either way picturing hell as eternal suffering serves to amplify the authority of the Biśnoī teachers and the supremacy of the Biśnoī religious doctrine.

With this article I would like to draw attention to Buddhist murals in the southwest of Sri Lanka where a spirited artistic scene has developed during the revival of Buddhism (18 th century). The artists produced mainly murals which depict the Life of Gautama Buddha (Buddhacarita) and his previous lifes (Jātaka). The construction of these paintings changed dramatically at the end of the 19 th century, when the traditional continuing and two-dimensional style was displaced by a central perspective and single framed mode of painting. As an example I introduce an episode from the Ummagga-Jātaka, which is illustrated with all details in four monasteries and thereby covering the various painting styles. To show how closely the artists followed the written sources I provide the corresponding Sinhalese text by contrast with the Pali wording. During that period the knowledge of Sinhala among the members of the Sinhalese elites was at a loss and urban artists had to consult English renderings of Buddhist sources for the proper illustration of particular narratives. Regarding our episode from the Ummagga-Jātaka an essential error has crept into Chalmers English translation which is finally reflected in all murals of the 20 th century.

The present article focuses on appositional metaphoric compounds karmadhāraya-rūpaka in Sanskrit. A first section addresses some problems of compound typology in Western works, where appositional compounds have often been identified as copulative dvandva . Following this general analysis there is a section on appositional compounds from the perspective of the classical Sanskrit grammar, in particular the Pāṇinian tradition where the metaphorical aspect has not been explored specifically. The final section deals with the contribution of Sanskrit treatises on poetics to the identification of metaphoric compounds and their differentiation from compound similes. The approach suggested in later texts on poetics seems to be based on syntactical criteria, the ambiguity of the double-head topic, i. e. candra-mukha , a moon-face being specified in the comment. According to this, an appositional compound should be analysed as a simile, if the comment refers to the actual part of the compound, i.e. the subject of the simile, or as a metaphor, if the comment refers to the standard of comparison, thus shifting the focus of the sentence from the actual to the imagined entity.

This paper investigates the relationship between textuality and mathematics in the Saṅgītaratnākara , a Sanskrit work on music composed in the thirteenth century by Śārṅgadeva. Within the traditional Sanskrit knowledge system on musicology, the Saṅgītaratnākara can be regarded as a seminal work, given the commentaries it has inspired and the innovative features it contains. I shall explore some textual aspects which, in Medieval India, have contributed to establish the authority of this text and whose significance can be traced in later works. Among these are types of verbalization and mathematical procedures whose role, I shall argue, is entirely theoretical. In the Saṅgītaratnākara , calculations and diagrams underline an innovative language of musical speculation, as well as the relationship between theory and practice and the shaping influence of other śāstric traditions. The set of conventions which are based on a vocabulary and methods shared with other technical literatures, particularly prosody and mathematics, attests the variety of literary practices introduced by Śārṅgadeva. I shall argue that this text builds up a code whose aim and function are not necessarily musicological in character. Although orality clearly retains its special status as the archetype of learning, Śārṅgadeva’s contribution manifests the autonomy of literature on s aṅgīta as an “art” which constitutes an independent sphere of activity, defining its own rules, and adhering to its own criteria of value.

The Ahirbudhnyasaṃhitā, probably compiled in South India in the twelfth/thirteenth century, is one of the most interesting texts of the Vaiṣṇava Pāñcarātra tradition. Its most important deity is Sudarśana, the anthropomorphic discus of Viṣṇu, who is ritually worshipped by personal priests ( purohita , purodhas ) for the sake of the king. In contrast to other Pāñcarātra Saṃhitās, the Ahirbudhnyasaṃhitā contains extensive theological and cosmological chapters. It also shows traces of several other religious traditions. The paper is mainly devoted to this second characteristic and presents examples of influences from two sides, namely, from Śaivas on one hand and Atharvavedins on the other, and tries to give a possible explanation for their presence.

The study of the concept of meta-language, meta-linguistic devices, meta-rules and hermeneutic rules is pivotal to understand the linguistic as well as philosophical development of Indian textual history. While writing their works, the authors recur to linguistic, lexical, stylistic and doctrinal peculiarities. Sometime, in order to facilitate the reading, the authors themselves insert into their treatises some hermeneutical rules concerning concepts and technical terms. When such insertions are not present, it is likely to find signs, suggestions or abbreviations referring to those interpretative tools. All these devices are collectively called paribhāṣā s. The word of paribhāṣā variously translated as “meta-rule”, “interpretative-rule”, “hermeneutic-key”, “indication”, “technical definition” has been very scarcely investigated within the history of Indology. This is a proposal of a series of 6 articles, an introduction and a series of abstracts and biodata of the authors.

This paper is a brief survey on the concept of paribhāṣā throughout the whole Indian textual tradition. The contribute displays in a general way what is well developed by other articles of the volume. The most striking feature of this overview is that it highlights some issues concerning the translation of the word paribhāṣā as well as the general definitions formulated across Indian literary history. Possible alternative translations of the term paribhāṣā , from the history of ideas’ perspective, are as follows: meta-rule, hermeneutic rule, interpretative rule. The paper hints at the very core of the problem, namely the multi-tasking function of the paribhāṣā .

What is a paribhāṣā ? How does it work in Śrautasūtra-texts? This paper tries to examine these questions and to trace a story of the paribhāṣā s in the Śrautasūtras, giving some indications for future researches. Often translated as “meta-rule”, paribhāṣā is a primary derivative from the Sanskrit root “ bhāṣ ”, which means “to talk”, with the prefix “ pari ”, which means “around”, “beyond”. The term indicates a specific discourse “around” or “beyond” something. Therefore, it represents the link with the context, a hybrid element placed between text and context. A paribhāṣā is an explanation, an element around discourse that acts as a frame for what is said: it is a rule that is valid in a wider context than that of the object under analysis, that goes “beyond” discourse. It is a unique opportunity to glance at the ritual in itself, at the “ritual string”, in opposition to every “discourse of the ritual”. This rule’s validity is put into effect through the other rules expressed within the text, in other words it is a meta-rule. However, the subject of the relationship between paribhāṣā s and the texts of the śruti is still uncharted territory: the categorizations that have so far been suggested are weak or not useful, and need stronger foundations. The present paper pretends to be a first step in this direction.

The Kauśikasūtra has three sets of general rules, the first two (1.1–8 cum 1.9–23) consecutively opening up the sūtra -text, having an application to the adjoining context, and the third one (7.1–9.7) being seemingly prescribed for the rest of the work. The understanding of the Kauśikasūtra draws hugely on ascertaining the right meaning of these paribhāṣā s. The general rule 8.10 is an interesting example of such crux filologorum , wherein, regardless the emendation, the enouncement apparently bears little meaning and the paribhāṣā , as a whole, seems inapplicable. The paper discusses sixteen cases whereto the paribhāṣā 8.10 might be applied, starting from the instances thus indicated by the two commentators, Dārila and Keśava. In subsidiary, another subject is elucidated, the set of rites called manthāntāni karmāṇi , which, although there is no paribhāṣā regulating their function, they are prescribed by the sequence of rites 11.11–11.15, and are to be applied in the specified context. This is an example of the efforts done by the subsequent redactor(s) of the Kauśikasūtra , who have added general rules to elucidate the concise and obscure sūtra -text: an unspecified general rule (11.11ff) inserted in the adjoining context, and a specified, but redundant general rule (8.10) employed in the appropriate section, with little care for the consistency of the editorial work.

The present paper is targeted on three landmarks in the long story of the paribhāṣā s’ development. Two of these landmarks descended from the earliest testimony of Vyākaraṇa meta-rules, i. e. those included in Pāṇini’s grammar (fifth–fourth century BCE), and one which has been handed down as the first independent collection of paribhāṣā s and attributed to Vyāḍi. In particular a shift is highlighted between Kātyāyaṇa’s (third century BCE) integrative approach ( vacana ) and Patañjali’s (second century BCE) recourse to implicit paribhāṣā s in the Aṣṭādhyāyī as a powerful hermeneutical tool. A shift that helps in interpreting the need for a validation and collection of implicit pāṇinian paribhāṣā s as carried out by authors such as Vyāḍi.

This article provides a first investigation on the metarules adopted in the Mīmāṃsā school of textual exegesis. These are not systematically listed and discussed, but they can be seen at work throughout the history of Mīmāṃsā. The Mīmāṃsā school has the exegesis of the sacred texts called Veda as its main focus. The metarules used to understand the Vedic texts are, however, not derived from the Veda itself and are rather rational rules which can be derived from the use of language in general and which Mīmāṃsā authors recognized and analyzed. Since the metarules are considered to be not derived from the Veda, it is all but natural that later authors inspired by Mīmāṃsā apply them outside the precinct of the Veda, for instance in the fields of textual linguistics, poetics, theology and jurisprudence.

This contribution re-analyses some standpoints of the notion of paribhāṣā through the looking glass of later Advaita Vedānta. The article is limited to single text, namely Dharmarāja Adhvarīndra’s (17th–XVIIIth century) Vedānta Paribhāṣā . This text does not present the peculiarities of earlier paribhāṣā s, hence the title paribhāṣā somehow assumes a sense closer to “Elucidation” or “Manual”. Nevertheless, placing Vedānta Paribhāṣā within a wider historical and philosophical milieu, an attempt is made to investigate the reasons why Dharmarāja willingly chooses such an evocative title, which is solidly rooted on a technical background. Further, the paper proposes some hypothesis and case-studies concerning Dharmarāja’s understanding of paribhāṣā .

In my recent translation (Ferraro 2016) from Sanskrit to Portuguese of Nāgārjuna’s Mūlamadhyamakakārikā I have frequently consulted, among many others, Mark Siderits and Shōryū Katsura’s English version (Siderits / Katsura 2013) of the same work. In this review article I present some places where my understanding of Nāgārjuna’s words more markedly diverges from their translation. Regarding the ideal of “an English-speaking Nāgārjuna” as a work-in-progress which could be constantly improved, my observations aim to continue the list of remarks presented by Anne MacDonald in her review article (MacDonald 2015) of Siderits and Katsura’s work.