Language and Style of the Vedic Rsis

Language and Style of the Vedic Rsis
Author: Tat?i?a?na I?A?kovlevna Elizarenkova
Publisher: SUNY Press
Total Pages: 348
Release: 1995-01-01
Genre: Foreign Language Study
ISBN: 9780791416686

Elizarenkova, perhaps the greatest living scholar of the Rgveda and certainly its greatest linguist, explains here the relationships between a very complicated grammatical system and the peculiarities of style of the archaic religious poetry. The laudatory hymn is treated as an act of verbal communication between the poet Rsi and the deity, with the hymn itself transmitting certain information from man to god. From this viewpoint, the hymn is used as a means to maintain a circular exchange of gifts between the Rsis and their gods. Many peculiarities of the functioning of the grammatical system of the Rgveda are interpreted in connection with the model of the universe of the Vedic Aryan. For example, the concept of time as a circular process bears closely on the use of the verbal grammatical categories of tense and mood; the personification of some abstract forces can explain some irregularities in the functioning of the nominal category of gender; and the idea of magical power attributed to the Sacred Speech in general, and to the name of a god in particular, underlies the magical grammar of this religious poetry.

Forms and Degrees of Repetition in Texts

Forms and Degrees of Repetition in Texts
Author: Gabriel Altmann
Publisher: Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG
Total Pages: 220
Release: 2015-03-10
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 3110411946

The present volume presents objective methods to detect and analyse various forms of repetitions. Repetition of textual elements is more than a superficial phenomenon. It may even be considered as constitutive for units and relations in a text: on a primary level when no other way exists to establish a unit – as in a musical composition (a motif can be recognised as such only after at least one repetition) – and on a secondary, artistic level, where repetition is a consequence of the transfer of the equivalence principle from the paradigmatic axis to the syntagmatic one as showed by R. Jakobson. The analysis of repetitive elements and structures in texts with objective mathematical means can serve several practical and theoretical purposes, among them: Characterisation of texts by means of parameters (measures, indicators) as taken from established mathematical statistics or specifically constructed ones in individual cases. Comparison of texts on the basis of their quantitative characteristics and classification of the texts by the results. Research for the laws of text, which control the mechanisms connected to text creation. As a remote aim, the construction of a theory of text consisting of a system of text laws. The final attempt of every possible quantitative text analysis is the construction of a text theory. The book illustrates this on examples of such laws and corresponding empirical tests.

Epithets in the Rgveda

Epithets in the Rgveda
Author: J. Gonda
Publisher: Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG
Total Pages: 272
Release: 2018-12-03
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 3110908913

No detailed description available for "Epithets in the Rgveda".

Shankara and Indian Philosophy

Shankara and Indian Philosophy
Author: Natalia Isayeva
Publisher: State University of New York Press
Total Pages: 298
Release: 2016-03-22
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 1438407629

According to Advaita-Vedanta, God or Brahman is identical with the inner self (the Atman) of each person, while the rest of the world is nothing but objective illusion (maya). Shankara maintains that there are two primary levels of existence and knowledge: the higher knowledge that is Brahman itself, and the relative, limited knowledge, regarded as the very texture of the universe. Consequently, the task of a human being is to reach the absolute unity and the reality of Brahman—in other words, to reach the innermost self within his or her own being, discarding on the way all temporary characteristics and attributes.