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SriRangaSri List Archive: Message 00071 Dec 2005

 
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Thank you Shri.V.Sadagopan and Shri Hari Krishnan.

Let me first mention the context where I encountered the word
upalakshanam. It was in Shri S.M Srinivasa Chari's book
Vishistadvaita & Advaita which, as I understand, deals with
 Shri Vedanta Desikan's assertion of Vishistadvaita in his 
work Satadusani. My knowledge of Indian or western philosophical
 traditions is meagre if not nothing.

As I write the following I dont have the book in front of me.
Please bear with any false representation due to my poor 
understanding or memory.

When the author writes about the effect of rope-snake on the
 observer he mentions upalakshanam. My understanding at this 
point is that rope appearing as a snake is upalakshanam and 
its effect - fear - is upalakshya. Upalakshanam and its effect 
upalakshya cannot be syntactically linked. He translates 
upalakshanam as 'qualification per accidens' and contrasts it 
with viseshna( 'qualification per proprium'). At this point I 
realised the import of the word upalakshanam and my lack of 
full grasp of the word.

I also came across sources that translated upalakshanam as 
metonymy or synechdoche. This doesnt satisfy me. I think these
translations restrict the potential of the word.

I would like to read/hear more on this word in both philosophical
 and religious/aesthetical usage. 

I sincerely hope such a discourse is within this mailing list's
charter.

Thank you in advance.

with humble regards
Jagadish

--- Hari Krishnan <harikrishnan61@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

> 
> Right Hon'ble Srinivasa Sastri equates the Sanskrit
> upalakshana with the English synechdoche.  Explaining how
> the name 'Lakshmana' was synonymous with Rama and did not
> need a separate mention, he cites how Lakshmana was sent
> together with Rama, though Viswamitra asked only for Rama. 
> He points out that when Viswamitra speaks to the brothers
> on the way, he addresses only Rama and not Lakshmana.  Why
> does he do so?  Srinivasa Sastri says:
> 
> "If he talks to them, he only says 'Rama, Raghava'
> addressing the elder brother.  It would be uncharitable to
> assume that he did not like the presence of Lakshmana or
> that he wished intentionally to ignore him.  I suppose in
> his mind too, as in the minds of everybody else, to speak
> of Rama was to speak to the other brother too.  You need
> not specially have a form of address for it.  As he gives
> them instruction in various matters, he mentions Rama and
> not Lakshmana, except once or twice and that when he uses
> the dual number.  Even when he taught them the great twin
> mantras of Bala and Atibala, he taught them to Sri Rama. 
> The commentator, hard put to explain the matter, says that
> Lakshmana is also included in the word Rama by Upalakshana,
> the Sanskritic equivalent for one of the forms of the
> English figure of speech, synecdoche.  When Sri Rama is
> mentioned, Lakshmana is also included in it."
> 
> (Lectures on the Ramayana, Second Lecture, page 17)
> 
> Now, synecdoche is defined thus "a figure of speech by
> which a part is put for the whole (as fifty sail for fifty
> ships), the whole for a part (as society for high society),
> the species for the genus (as cutthroat for assassin), the
> genus for the species (as a creature for a man), or the
> name of the material for the thing made (as boards for
> stage)"
> 
> That is, when I say 'sail' by upalakshna I mean, 'ship' and
> not just the sail.  
> 
> Regards,
> 
> Hari Krishnan
> 





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