Mahābhāṣya

The Mahābhāṣya (Sanskrit: महाभाष्य, IPA: [məɦɑːbʱɑːʂjə], great commentary), attributed to Patañjali, is a commentary on selected rules of Sanskrit grammar from Pāṇini's treatise, the Ashtadhyayi, as well as Kātyāyana's Varttika, an elaboration of Pāṇini's grammar.^[1] It is dated to the 2nd century B.C.

Overview

Patañjali is one of the three most famous Sanskrit grammarians of ancient India, other two being Pāṇini and Kātyayana who preceded Patañjali (dated to ca. 150 BC). Kātyayana's work (nearly 1500 vārtikas on Pāṇini) is available only through references in Patañjali's work.

It was with Patañjali that Indian linguistic science reached its definite form. The system thus established is extremely detailed as to shiksha (phonology, including accent) and vyakarana (grammar and morphology). Syntax is scarcely touched, because synax is not important in this highly inflexional language, but nirukta (etymology) is discussed, and these etymologies naturally lead to semantic explanations. People interpret his work to be a defense of Pāṇini, whose Sutras are elaborated meaningfully. Patañjali also examines Kātyāyana rather severely. But the main contributions of Patañjali lies in the treatment of the principles of grammar enunciated by him.

Kātyayana introduced semantic discourse into grammar, which was further elaborated by Patañjali to such an extent that Mahābhāṣya can be called a mix of grammar as such as well as a philosophy of grammar. Kāśika-vritti by Jayāditya and Vāmana (mentioned by Itsing) included viewpoints of other grammarians also which did nor conform to Patañjali's views. Many commentaries on Mahābhāṣya were written, of which Kaiyaṭa's commentary named Pradīpa (ca. 11th century AD) is most celebrated.

After Kaiyaṭa, interest in the study of Sanskrit grammar according to traditional Pāṇinian sequence of sūtras started declining, and a new simplified system gained ground which was started by Buddhist scholar Dharmakirti through his commentary on Pāṇini named Rūpāvatāra, which excluded Vedic sūtras of Pāṇini in which Dharmakīrti had no interest and dealt with only 2664 sutras.

James R. Ballantyne (1813–1864) published the first part of the Mahābhāṣya of Patañjali in 1856, for the first time opening native Indian grammatical tradition to a wider European scholarly audience.

Swami Vivekananda remarks that "The best prose in Sanskrit is Patanjali's Mahâbhâshya."

Notes

1. ^ K. Kunjunni Raja. "Philosophical elements in Patañjali's Mahābhāṣya". In Harold G. Coward, K. Kunjunni Raja. Encyclopedia of Indian philosophies. 5 (The Philosophy of the Grammarians). Motilal Banarsidass Publ. pp. 115. ISBN 8120804260. 

References

External links

• vyaakaraN mahaabhaaShya in Devanagari.
• vyaakaraN mahaabhaaShya in CSX at GRETIL.
• VyaakaraN Mahaabhaashya in Roman transliteration

Further reading

• The Mahābhāṣya of Patañjali with annotation (Ahnikas I–IV), Translated by Surendranath Dasgupta, Published by Indian Council of Philosophical Research
• Mahābhāṣya of Patañjali (Śrīmadbhagavat-patañjali-muni-viracitaṃ Pātañjalaṃ Mahābhāṣyam) by Patañjali (in Sanskrit), Publisher: Vārāṇasī : Vāṇīvilāsa Prakāśana, 1987-1988. ,OCLC: 20995237
• Bronkhorst, Johannes, 1992. Pāṇini's View of Meaning and its Western Counterpart. In, Maxim Stamenov (ed.) Current Advances in Semantic Theory. Amsterdam: J. Benjamins. (455-64)
• Scharfe, Helmut, 1977. Grammatical Literature. Vol. V, Fasc. 2, History of Indian Literature, (ed.) Jan Gonda. Wiesbaden: Otto Harrassowitz.
• Staal, J.F. (ed.), 1985. A Reader on Sanskrit Grammarians. Delhi: Motilal Banarasidass.

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