[INDOLOGY] Alchemy metaphor

[Ashok Aklujkar]

Dear Christopher, 

This is mainly to conclude my participation in the present discussion by taking note of a few specific points. (kindly excuse the mixture of transliteration conventions; I have not yet learned how to type the diacritics in Apple's Mail program; advice welcome.)

1. In my last post principally addressed to Prof. Matthew Kapstein, please correct the citation of Paa.nini 3.3.113 to k.rtya-lu.to bahulam. My thanks to Prof. George Cardona for bringing the wrong typing to my attention.

2. The video Dr. Dominik Wujastyk brought to our attention on 08 July is engaging and valuable. But it does not imply that mercury does not leave gold behind or mercury does not purify gold. Such implication is what we need to set my interpretation of the Abhinava-gupta passage aside. The narrator's relevant words, to the extent I could catch them, are:  "[mercury was used] for making gold." "for extracting gold and purifying it"  "mercury wraps itself up like a bed sheet". "Gold has almost completely vanished.  It's still there of course; it's just dissolved" (If necessary, those who can enhance the sound should give a transcript of the whole text).  Certainly no clear or direct support for taking vedha as 'transmuting'. vedha may be viewed as leading up to transmutation -- as causing it or being instrumental in some way, but it is not itself transmutation, and the word denoting it does not have transmutation as a part of its meaning. 

3. DW cited the following passage in his 09 July post: 
	>At Rasaratnasamuccaya 8.94-95 there is a definition of śabdavedha. from blowing of iron, with mercury in the mouth, there is the creation of goldenness and silverness. That is known as Word-vedha.and the commentator makes it even more explicity that this is transmutation, using pari-ṇam.  Rasaratnasamuccayabodhinī on 8.95: ... tat lauhakhaṇḍaṃ svarṇādirūpeṇa pariṇatam//that bit of iron is converted into the form of gold etc. ... yatra vedhe svarṇādirūpeṇa pariṇamet sa śabdavedha ityarthaḥ// Word-vedha is where it converts with the form of gold etc. ...The operation being described here is not unclear.  The alchemist puts a piece of mercury in his mouth and blows on a piece of iron.  It becomes golden or silvery.  This "becoming" is "vedha."<
	It would have been better also to have the words of the Rasaratnasamuccaya  itself. Even if we confine ourselves to the commentary, it is clear that vedha refers to a stage preceding transformation. The  phrase yatra vedhe, even if it is not understood as  equal in meaaning to a locative absolute phrase like yasmin vedhe sati, must be taken as a situating phrase for the phenomenon of pari.naama. One should differentiate between transmuting implied by the context as a whole and  transmuting signified by a word. 
	Note also that what emerges is gold, something superior. 

4. In the passage added by Prof. Torella, there is something that could be useful to understanding the passage with which out discussion started, but it is difficult to determine the precise nature of that something, because the new passage  has its own 
difficulties.  ĪPvv III p. 348 reads (I have supplied the words you had dropped): 
	aham ity eka-rasena anuvedhe tu yadaa idantaa aacchaaditaa bhavati bhaavanaa-saatmyaad ii;svara-sadaa;siva-sa.mvidi iva turya-da;sayaa.m rasa-viddha-taamra-kanaka-nyaayena, yadā vā sarvathaiva pradhvaṃsitā vidrāvitā vā bhavati turyātīta-daśāyāṃ ;saakta-sa.mvidi iva . . . tan-nija-rūpa-samyag-viddha-kanaka-rūpatātyanta-jaraṇāpādita-tat-saṃskāra-vaśa-pītalatāvaśeṣa-vidruta-rasa-nyāyena, tadaa puur.na-svaatantryollaasa eva deha eva sati api ni;se.sa-vibhuuti-laabhaat sadaa;sivaadi-;sariiravat. 
	Let us assume that the editor has punctuated the sentence(s) correctly and that he is justified in dissolving the sandhis the way he has. The passage does not come across as problem-free. At least the following questions present themselves: Is Abhinava speaking of two stages or understandings as ii;svara-sadaa;siva-sa.mvidi and ;saakta-sa.mvidi or  taamra-kanaka-nyaaya (or rasa-viddha-taamra-kanaka-nyaaya) and vidruta-rasa-nyāya (or pītalatāvaśeṣa-vidruta-rasa-nyāya) seem to indicate? Is tad/tan to be compounded with the following nija? If 'yes', the resultant expression sounds odd. If 'no', what does tad stand for? Can samyak, an adverb, naturally occur between nija-ruupa and viddha? If nija-ruupa and samyag-viddha are to qualify kanaka or kanaka-ruupataa jointly, what would be the meaning that would not be out of step with the following words -- 'own form and thouroughly penetrated' or 'thouroughly penetrated by own form'?  What is the reference of tat in tat-sa.mskaara? If pittalataa is 'gold leaf' as you say, how did you arrive at that meaning? Ordinarily pitta means 'bile' and lataa means 'vine'. (I think pittalataa is not be divided as pitta and lataa but as pittala 'brass' and -taa, abstraction suffix). 

5. Personally, I would change a translation, even if a hundred earlier scholars had accepted it in the past,  if it is pointed out to me that a good philological case has not been made for it. 

6. I had drafted the preceding yesterday. I only revised it this morning. Just before posting it, I noticed that Dr. Wujastyk has queried your translation and Prof. Torella has already pointed out the desirability of rendering pittalataa differently. 

Thanks for the rewarding exchanges. 

Best wishes.

a.a.



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