Prayuktakhyata-Manjari (A Lexicon of Verbs That are Actually in Use)

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This book is a Product of Gopi-parana Prabhu's defunct school in Govardhana, called Srimad-bhagavata-vidya-pitham. As its name suggests, the Sanskrit school was centered on the knowledge of Bhagavatam: Its first verse, the foundation of this knowledge, is dissected here in the second part of the book with Gaurapada Dasa's translation of Sridhara Svami's commentary and Matsya Avatara Dasa's translation of Visvanatha Cakravarti's commentary.

Rupa Gosvami (1489-1564) was a pioneer of Gaudiya Vaisnavism. He received his education in Bengal, India. Afterward, he lived in Vrndavana for most of his life. He wrote Prayuktakhyata-manjarri by summarizing Akhyata-candrika, a book on verbs written by Bhatta Malla. Sometimes Rupa Gosvami paraphrased Akhyata-candrika, on occasion he deleted verbs, in some section he added verbs, and at times he narrowed down the meaning of a verb. He mentions Bhatta Malla in the opening verse. Rupa Gosvami was a renowned poet and erudite person, therefore his authority on the topic omakes this book highly valuable.

Jiva gosvami (1513-1598), Rupa Gosvami's nephew, was the author of the grammatical treatise called Hari-namamrta-vyakarana, rivalled only by Bhattaji Diksita's Siddhanta-kaumudi (c. 1600). Hari-namamrta-vyakarana is an important resource book in general, and is also useful in sourcing the information in Prayuktakhyata-manjari because not every grammatical detail was covered by Panini (Astadhyayi), katyayana (Varttika), Patanjali (Mahabhasya) and Jayaditya and Vamana (kasika).

In India, most students of Sanskrit learn it by studying Siddhanta-kaumudi. Without being asked, students of Siddhanta-kaumudi at a Sanskrit college in Puri, Orissa, emphatically told us that Hari-namamrta-vyakarana is more complete than Siddhanta-kaumudi. It is more complete insofar as it contains more examples, more relevant information, and more detailed explanations. Jiva Gosvami was the most outstanding scholar of his time. After studying in Bengal, he went to Varanasi and learned under the tutelage of Madhusudana Vacaspati. Subsequently, Jiva Gosvami went to Vrndavana and lived there for the rest of his life. According to tradition, in Vrndavana Jiva Gosvami defeated the touring dig-vijayi pandit Rupa Narayana in a seven-day debate. Rupa Gosvami had declined to compete with the dig-vijayi pandit out of humility.

The methodology in Prayuktakhyata-manjari is as follows: Verbs which share a particular meaning are grouped together, and a noun ending in the locative case is used to indicate their sense. This noun is in bold type in the translation. However, in the third section the third chapter, this system is reversed: Various nouns in the locative case indicative case indicate the various meanings of one verb which is in bola type in the verse.

The verbs are in the present tense. However, whichever usage is seen with verbs (akhyata) also applies to verbal nouns (krdanta) and to participles. For example, uri-karoti (he accepts, agrees) and uri-krtya have the same fundamental sense.

Our format is this: All the verses and the word-for word meanings for one section (varga) are given together in one block; immediately afterward, the translations of the verses are given together in one block. In the translation each meaning, the Sanskrit noun in bold type, is numbered. This number refers to the verse in which the meaning is found. Consequently, in the translation sometimes a verse number occurs twice. Occasionally, the verbs linked to that meaning encompass several verses.

Often, two or more groups of verbs are compacted together in one verse. Rupa Gosvami uses a classical system to make the reader understand when a group starts and stop. The rule is: tu signifies the end of a definition, and atha denotes the start of a new one. However, the word tu cannot be used at the beginning of a line. The earliest position it can occupy is that of the second word. This can lead to confusion as sometimes a verb belonging to the next group is used as the first word in a line (followed by tu) just to facilitate the rule that tu cannot be used as the first word of a line.

A few grammatical points have to be kept in mind while reading this treatise:

Most of the verbal roots shown here are found in Panini's Dhatu-patha (list of verbal roots). In this regard, we also consulted Brhad-dhatu-kusumakara and Madhaviya dhatu-vrtti.

Often, a tenth class verbal root listed as ubhayapadi by Panini is listed as parasmaipadi by Jiva Gosvami. An example is the root katha vatha-prabandhe (to talk) On this topic, Jiva Gosvami follows Madhaviya dhatu-vrtti.

In the original text of the third section of the third chapter, Rupa Gosvami lists the sv-adis (fifth class dhatus) after the tud-adis (sixth class dhatus), and the rudh-adis (seventh class dhatus) after the adis (eighth class dhatus).

This is in accordance with one edition of Akhyata-candrika. However, to avoid confusion, we switched the sequence of verses, in conformity with the standard order of the class to tenth class), and renumbered the verses. Another-Caukhamba edition of Another Caukhamba edition of Akhyata-candrika lists the ten classes of verbal roots in order.

A jhar phoneme of the rudh-adis is optionally deleted. Thus runddhe can also be written rundhe, vintte can be written vinte, and so on. Akhyata-candrika and Prayuktakhyata-manjari consistently use the second option. For the sake of clarity, we follow the text in the word-for-word meanings but, in the translation, we use the first option.

A prefix can modify the status of a verbal root as transitive or intransitive, and as Parasmaipada or atmanepada. The references are provided in the footnotes in the translation. In general, other types of variations of verb conjugations and explanations of verbal formations are sourced in the word-for-word meanings or in the footnotes therein. The details regarding intransitive verbal roots are given in texts 3.4.3-8.

The sutra numbers in the word-for-word meanings refer to Astadhyayi, except when specified otherwise.

For the most part, letter or letters in square brackets before and after a verbal root or a suffix are indicatory letters that convey grammatical significance. An indicatory letter gets deleted: tasya lopah (Astadhyayi 1.3.9). To ease pronunciation and to ease the understanding of the script, the tradition is to add the vowel 'a' after a verbal root ending in a consonant, but with our system of brackets there is no need for it. Thus the verbal root hrs [a] tustau, for instance, is listed as hrs tustau because the vowel 'a' does not convey grammatical significance and because in this way there is no confusion in regard to pronouncing verbal roots which end in the vowel a, such as katha vakya-prabandhe (10p).

Moreover, the number of section (varga) in Akhyata-candrika and in Prayukhyata-manjari is the same. The names and topics of these sections are identical also, except for the last one: Bhatta Malla entitles his last section "Atmanepada-parasmaipada- vargah" whereas Rupa Gosvami calls his last section "Akarmaka-dhatavah." Overall, Rupa Gosvami significantly improved upon Akhyata-candrika since in the latter the writing style is occasionally obscure and many verbs are listed although they are not in use. Prayuktakhyatamanjari is easy to read and is a valuable resource, particularly in the field of translation. Rupa Gosvami writes:

Muda yathartha-namniyam kavi-saranga-rangada|
sevyatam kovida-ganaih prayuktakhyata-manjari||

May intelligent persons joyfully study Prayuktakhyata-manjari, whose name fits the meaning because it is a blossom in the form of factual verbs that delights scholarly bees.(Prayuktakhyata-manjari 3.4.15)

Although nowadays most of the information in this book is in Sanskrit-English dictionaries, Prayuktakhyata-manjari remains precious as an authoritative reference because often those dictionaries list dozens of meanings for a verb whereas this book provides the standard meanings: That is especially important with regard to understanding classic texts. An example is the verb sacanta in Purusa-sukta 16 (Rg-Veda), which Rupa Gosvami only lists in his category called sangati-bheda (a particular kind of connection, i.e. to belong): This meaning is omitted by the commentators on Purusa-sukta yet it is the main sense in the context. Rupa Gosvami was familiar with the topic because in krsna-janmatithi-vidhi, he quoted the whole Purusa-sukta from sukla Yajur- Veda. In Vedic culture, commentators explain individual nouns by quoting Amara-kosa, Medini-kosa, and so on, whereas their explanations of verbs is whimsical. By contrast, Bhatta Malla is not as correct as Rupa Gosvami because he lists that verb in the general category of sangati (Akhyata-candrika 2.4.39); because he also lists the verb in the sense of seka (to sprinkle) (Akhyata-candrika 32.4.10), a meaning of the verbal root which is not in usage in a verbal form; and because he also lists in the sense of samavaya (inherence) (Akhyata-candrika 3.3.133), which is simply the vague meaning of the verbal root.

Moreover, Prayuktakhyata-manjari should be especially cherished by anyone who desires to write a verse, because a poet at work requires a compendium of synonyms of nouns, such as Amara-kosa, and a compendium of synonyms of verbs: That is how nectar is extracted from this treatise. With this in mind, in the above verse Rupa Gosvami used the word kavi (scholar, poet). Therefore Prayuktakhyata-manjari deserves the same status as Amara-kosa. In Vedic culture, a compendium of groups of synonyms of verbs is not a later invention. The first Sanskrit dictionary, Nighantu, commented upon by Yaska (his book is called Nirukta), consists of a mixed series of synonyms of verbs and of synonyms of nouns. In addition, Prayuktakhyata- manjari contains a short dissertation on luptopama (elliptical simile) (3.2.3-6), a topic found in every treatise on Sanskrit poetics. corrected, mostly by consulting Akhyata-candrika. A table of corrections is included before the index of verbs at the end. Haridasa Sastri saya his sources are twofold: one manuscript from Sri-Gauranga-grantha-mandira in Varahanagara and another from Sri-Govinda-granthagara in Jaipur. Moreover, we consulted two different editions of A khyata-candrika Caukhamba Publishers (Varanasi, India).

The authenticity of Rupa Gosvami's authorship of Prayuktakhyata-manjari cannot be doubted because it is mentioned in Bhakti-ratnakara, written by Narahari Cakravarti Thakura. Moreover, Haridasa of Navadvipa, Bengal, a well-known authority, says that although he himself was never able to obtain a copy of Rupa Gosvami's book, he saw the name Prayukhakhyata-candrika in Bhakti-ratankara as well as in the list of Rupa Gosvami's books at the end of a manuscript of Jiva Gosvami's Laghu-vaisnava-tosani .Haridasa Dasa says Rupa Gosvami's book is a compendium of verbs similar to Bhatta Malla's dhikari, Akhyata-candrika, O.B.L Kapoor (b. 1909) states that in Bhakti-ratnakara, the list of Rupa Gosvami's works was provided by krsna Dasa Adhikari, a disciple of Jiva Gosvami. In that connection, O.B.L Kapoor mentions the name Prayuktakhyata-candrika. Nonetheless, as shown in the above verse, Rupa Gosvami calls his book: Prayuktakhyata-manjari.