1.2.13
Mīmāṃsā Sūtra / Adhyāya 1 / 1.2.13
स्त्र्यपराधात् कर्तुश् च पुत्रदर्शनम्
stryaparādhāt kartuś ca putradarśanam
The line
And, because of the wife's fault, there is the agent's mere seeing of a son.
नेपालीमा
र पत्नीको दोषले कर्ताले छोरालाई देख्नु मात्र हुन्छ।
Where it sits
This is one of the sentences under the perceptual conflict of 1.2.2. The pravara injunction is the command the sentence completes. Kartṛ (कर्तृ) is the man whose line is recited. Stuti from 1.2.7 is still the role.
Split: strī-aparādhāt (स्त्री-अपराधात्) + kartuḥ (कर्तुः) + ca (च) + putra-darśanam (पुत्र-दर्शनम्)
Sanskrit, in depth
The words
| Word | Grammar | Sense |
|---|---|---|
| strī-aparādhāt (स्त्री-अपराधात्) | ablative singular, masculine | because of the wife's fault |
| kartuḥ (कर्तुः) | genitive singular, masculine | of the agent, the husband |
| ca (च) | indeclinable | and |
| putra-darśanam (पुत्र-दर्शनम्) | nominative singular, neuter | the seeing of a son |
The phrases
The sentence 'we do not know this, whether we are brahmins or not' belongs with the pravara. In the pravara the sacrificer recites the names of his ancestral sages, and the priests are addressed by that line of names. The sentence is expected by that injunction.
The praise is that even a man who was not a brahmin would be brought in by the ancestral formula. The confession of ignorance is figurative, because the matter is hard to know. The difficulty is the wife's fault and the agent's merely seeing a son. Seeing a boy grow up in the house does not by itself certify the line of sages. The formula of names is what the rite relies on. It is not a command to be uncertain, and it is not a report that the sacrificer has no lineage.
Sanskrit in this line
The pāṭha (पाठ) reads aparādhāt (अपराधात्), a fault, without strī (स्त्री). The bhāṣya (भाष्य) explains the line by stryaparādha (स्त्र्यपराध), the wife's fault, together with the agent's seeing of the son. The line taught here is stryaparādhāt (स्त्र्यपराधात्) kartuś (कर्तुश्) ca putradarśanam (पुत्रदर्शनम्). Putradarśana (पुत्रदर्शन) is a tatpuruṣa (तत्पुरुष).
Say it back
Retell the decision in plain words: the ancestral recitation is praised, and the sentence about not knowing is not a duty to be ignorant.
Next
1.2.14. The desire is not tied to a fruit one can see at once.