vaNa- iva&anaBaaYyaM (The Metaphysics of the Sanskrit Alphabet) by Ravi Khanna gee_kay@vsnl.com The Circle of Life by M. C. Escher Paper presented at the International Seminar on SABDA: TEXT AND INTERPRETATION IN INDIAN THOUGHT 2-4 February 2004 Organized by Centre of Linguistics and English, Jawaharlal Nehru University vaNa- iva&anaBaaYyaM (The Metaphysics of the Sanskrit Alphabet) I commence my talk with a quote from Dr. Kapil Kapoor’s paper – “Vivarta & Parināma – Bhartriharī`s Theory of Language” – 1996. He cites Rig Veda I.164.41 as follows … gaurih mimāya salilāni takśati ekpadī dwipadī sā catuspadī astāpadī navpadī babhūvusī sahasrāksarā parme vyöman “ Gauri is the symbol of vāk or speech, according to the shrutīs …. the real significance is that the principle of vāk creates or fashions out the manifold forms out of the waters of the infinite ‘ocean of reality’ … the parme vyöman. You cannot cut forms or draw lines in water, you can do that only in space but ; but reality like water is continuous, indivisible…” The word used here for ocean is salilâ which actually means the surging of waters, the expression here alludes to an agitated ocean, one in which the waves are being […]