Tattvabindu

Tattvabindu is a concise but technically demanding work of Mīmāṃsā philosophy composed by Vācaspati Miśra and presented in this edition together with the extensive commentary Tattvavibhāvanā by Ṛṣiputra Parameśvara. The volume addresses fundamental questions in Indian philosophy of language, especially the nature of linguistic meaning, the relation between words and sentences, and the process through which verbal cognition arises. A major portion of the text examines and rejects the grammarians’ doctrine of sphoṭa, particularly as developed by Bhartṛhari and Maṇḍana Miśra. Vācaspati Miśra reinforces Kumārila Bhaṭṭa’s critique of the claim that an indivisible linguistic entity conveys meaning independently of articulated sounds. In its place, the work analyzes how phonemes, words, memory, syntactic expectancy, semantic compatibility, proximity, and speaker intention collectively contribute to sentence comprehension. The text further considers competing theories of sentence meaning associated with the Bhāṭṭa and Prābhākara schools of Mīmāṃsā. These include the abhihitānvaya theory, according to which independently denoted word meanings are subsequently connected, and the anvitābhidhāna theory, which holds that words directly express meanings already related within the sentence. The work also engages with grammatical, Nyāya, Buddhist, and Vedāntic positions, making it an important source for the comparative study of Indian semantics and epistemology. Parameśvara’s commentary is especially valuable for clarifying Vācaspati’s compressed arguments, identifying earlier interpretations, discussing variant readings, and situating the text within the wider traditions of Kumārila, Prabhākara, Śālikanātha, Maṇḍana Miśra, and later Mīmāṃsā scholarship. The edition includes an extensive English introduction, appendices, indexes, bibliography, and critical textual notes.