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Vakyartha Smriti In Hindu Religion

In Hindu religion, Vakyartha Smriti literally means the understanding and smriti (recollection) of  the artha (meaning) of vakya (a sentence). Vakyartha smriti is interpreted differently by different schools of philosophy. Some take it as just the putting together of the meaning associated with the subject part (uddeshya) and the predicate part (vidheya) of a sentence.

According to grammarians, vakyartha is the comprehensive sense conveyed by putting together grammatically all the words in the sentence. Here, by smriti is meant the flash which strikes the mind when the sentence has been fully uttered.

Mimamsa philosophy takes it as the complexity o the meanings conveyed by all the words. According to it, the shakti (power) represented by the words makes the sentences properly understood.

Nyaya philosophy goes a step further and relates the word Vakyartha smriti to the recollection of the intended sense through the theory of ‘logical comparison’ (anumana) and the identification of the sense from a statement from an authoritative source. This philosophy accepts anumana as an independent source of valid knowledge (pramana).

An atidesha vakya is a statement from an authoritative source which gives a description of an object to be identified with a known object. The cognition of an object that answers to the description given by the authoritative source stimulates the recollection of atidesha vakya  is termed smriti by Nyaya philosophy. For instance, a person does know the animal called gavaya, but identifies it as such because it resembles a cow. This principle is effectively employed in logical disputations by Nyaya philosophers.