[INDOLOGY] Alchemy metaphor

[Ashok Aklujkar]

The understanding of the passage that is being proposed is largely on the right track, especially with the contribution of Dominik.However, I should draw attention to two points that may lead to a different understanding of the chemical/alchemical process.

1. Literally, the translation of yena prameyatvāt tat cyavata iva should be 
	"whereby that (thing śūnyādi-deha-dhātv-anta) slips down/falls away, as it were, from being an object of cognition" (i.e., it ceases to be -- no longer figures in -- cognition, although it is out there as before)," 
	not 
	"by which their objectivity falls away as it were". 
	Note that the subject of cyavate is tat,  a neuter gender word, and prameyatvāt is an ablative. śūnyādi-deha-dhātv-anta is a bahu-vriihi and, therefore, something like 'thing', 'entity', 'assemblage' must be understood as its vi;se.sya. 
	Now, one can say that the earlier translation may be grammatically opaque but it essentially conveys the same thing as the translation I have offered. However, as you will see from the next point, the literal translation assists us in understanding the analogy rightly. 

2. In prāṇa-dehādi-dhātuḥ saṃvid-rasena abhiniviṣṭo ’tyantaṃ kanaka-dhātur iva jīrṇaḥ kriyate, one would expect pure consciousness to be similar to pure gold. It would be inappropriate to compare it with what is left after gold is taken out. The process conveyed by jīrṇaḥ should, therefore, be one in which impurities of gold are taken out as a result of its saturation by something (there is no word in the passage that would suggest that we should set aside the usual meanings of vidhyate, viddha and abhinivi.s.ta ranging from 'pierce' to 'permeate').

That that 'something' is paarada 'mercury' is what we learn from Rasa-ratna-samuccaya 5.11: वेधजं सुवर्णम् -- पारद-वेधेन संजातं सुवर्णम्. 

Note that here gold is spoken of as the outcome, not anything else that goes with gold. 

The same Rasa-ratna-samuccaya, at 5.21-22, speaks of सुवर्णं जलवद् द्रुतं द्रव-रूपं वा करोति, which 'liquidity' notion is also found in the Abhinava-gupta passage under consideration. 

(I give the Rasa-ratna-samuccaya references according to the आयुर्वेदीय महाकोश अर्थात् आयुर्वेदीय शब्दकोश, p. 1628, of वेणीमाधवशास्त्री जोशी and नारायण हरी जोशी, मुम्बई : महाराष्ट्र राज्य साहित्य आणि संस्कृति मंडळ, १९६८. I do not have access at the moment to the Rasa-ratna-samuccaya itself).
	
a.a.


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