Parātrīṃśikā Vivaraṇa (Part 26): What Does “More” Really Add? Whiter, Whitest, and the Problem of Added Meaning

 

The garment is white, the swan is white — and the whole point of the passage is to ask what, if anything, is really added when one is called “whiter” or “whitest.”

A grammatical test-case: “this is whiter than these two”

tatra ayaṃ śuklo ’yaṃ śuklaḥ
ayam anayor atiśayena śuklaḥ iti vākye ’yam arthaḥ —
anayoḥ śuklayoḥ madhyāt atiśayena ayaṃ śuklaḥ śuklataraḥ

“Here, in a sentence such as: ‘this is white, this is white; this one is white to a greater degree than these two’ — the meaning is this: among these two white things, this one is whiter, śuklatara.”

Abhinava now shifts into a grammatical example, but the point is still philosophical.

He takes something very ordinary — “this is white,” “that is white,” “this one is whiter” — in order to examine what comparative language really does. That matters because he has been tracking the word uttara with great care, and now he is testing the deeper logic of comparison itself.

At first the example seems simple. Two things are both white, but one is whiter. Fine. But Abhinava is not interested in the surface convenience of the sentence. He wants to know: what exactly is added when we say “whiter”? Is there a genuinely new content there, or is the language only re-arranging what was already given?

That is why he begins so plainly. He wants the structure to be unmistakable:

• both things already share whiteness,
• then one is said to exceed the other in whiteness.

So the question is already implied:
if both are white, what does the comparative really contribute beyond relation?

This is a very Abhinavian move. He does not let grammar remain innocent. Even a simple comparative like “whiter” becomes a place to ask whether language is revealing a real extra thing, or only marking contrast within what is already there.

So the point of the example is just to set the field clearly:
two terms,
one common quality,
and then comparative excess.

The real pressure will come in the next steps, when he asks whether that “excess” actually introduces anything substantial.

The superlative test: palace, cloth, swan — and “whitest”

eṣāṃ tu śuklānām ayam atiśayena śuklaḥ iti ko ’yam adhiko ’rthaḥ
tathāhi — ayaṃ prāsādaḥ śuklaḥ ayaṃ paṭaḥ śuklaḥ ayaṃ haṃsaś ca śuklaḥ
eṣāṃ sātiśayaḥ śuklatamaḥ iti

“But then, among these white things, ‘this one is white to a greater degree’ — what additional meaning is there here? For example: this palace is white, this cloth is white, and this swan is white; among these, this one is the whitest, śuklatama.”

Now Abhinava widens the example.

Before, it was a simple comparison between two white things. Now he moves to a small group: palace, cloth, swan — all white. Then one is called śuklatama, the whitest.

And immediately he asks the real question: what extra meaning is actually being conveyed?

That is the key.

Because all the members of the set are already admitted to be white. So when one is then singled out as “whitest,” is language really introducing a new positive content? Or is it only intensifying a relation inside an already shared field?

That is why the examples are helpful. A white palace, a white cloth, a white swan — these are different things, but whiteness is already common to them all. So what exactly is the superlative doing? Is it uncovering some new kind of whiteness? Clearly not. It is still working only within the same quality.

This matters because Abhinava is probing comparative language very carefully. He is trying to see whether terms like -tara and -tama really disclose an additional substantive reality, or whether they only mark relative prominence within what is already given.

So the force of this point is simple:
the superlative sounds stronger,
but it does not obviously bring in a new essence.

It still depends on the same shared predicate, only arranged through ranking.

And that is why he presses the question so directly:
if all are white already, what exactly has been added by saying “whitest”?

If all are already white, what exactly has been added?

tatra prāsādo ’pi śuklaḥ paṭo ’pi śuklaḥ iti kim iva adhikam uktaṃ syāt

tam api pratyaye evaṃvidha-vākya-karaṇam ayuktam eva

“There, the palace too is white, the cloth too is white — so what further thing has really been said? To form such a sentence even with the superlative suffix is, in this way, not really fitting.”

Now Abhinava states the pressure directly.

The palace is white.
The cloth is white.
The swan is white.

So when one of them is then called “the whitest,” what has actually been added?

That is his question.

And it is a good one, because the superlative sounds as though it must be saying something stronger, more substantial, more final. But once you look closely, it is still moving entirely within the already admitted field of whiteness. It has not introduced a new quality. It has only arranged the already shared quality through ranking.

That is why he says such sentence-making is, in this way, not really fitting. He is not denying that people speak like this. Of course they do. He is saying that if one expects the grammar itself to deliver some deep extra content, it disappoints. The sentence sounds fuller than it really is.

A simple human way to feel the point:

If three people are all called “kind,” and then one is called “the kindest,” that may be useful in conversation. But the word “kindest” does not create a new essence beyond kindness. It only pushes comparison harder inside the same field.

That is what Abhinava is exposing here.

So the point is not “comparatives are forbidden.”
The point is: do not imagine that grammatical intensification automatically gives you a deeper reality.

The language becomes stronger.
The content may not.

The comparative and the superlative do not work in the same way

na ca tarapaḥ tamap adhikam atiśayam abhidadhyāt
evaṃ tāvat tu syāt — avivakṣite pratiyogi-viśeṣe tamaprayogaḥ
pratiyogi-viśeṣāpekṣāyāṃ tu tarap pratiyogyapekṣaiva

“And the comparative suffix -tara does not express the same kind of added excess as the superlative -tama. Rather, this much can be said: when no specific counter-term is intended, -tama may be used; but where there is dependence on a specific counter-term, -tara depends precisely on that comparator.”

Now Abhinava makes the distinction more exact.

He says we should not blur -tara and -tama together, as if both simply meant “more and more.” They function differently.

The superlative, -tama, can be used more loosely, when the specific competitor is not sharply intended. One can say “the whitest” within a general field. But the comparative, -tara, is stricter. It requires a specific comparator. “Whiter” always means whiter than something determinate.

That is the important point.

So -tara is more tightly relational. It cannot stand on its own. Its meaning leans directly on a particular counter-term. Without that, the comparative has nothing clear to bite into.

That matters because Abhinava is still tracking how language depends on contrast. The comparative is especially revealing here: it does not give you a new independent content; it points to one thing only by measuring it against another.

A simple example:

• “brightest” can be said of a star in a general sky
• but “brighter” immediately raises the question: brighter than what?

That is the sort of distinction he is making.

So this point sharpens the whole discussion:
the comparative is even more dependent on relational contrast than the superlative.

And that is why it matters for Abhinava’s larger concern. He is showing, step by step, that these grammatical forms do not easily support the idea of a self-standing “more” that exists by itself. Their meaning is built out of relation.

In the dual construction, only one comparator is really functioning

dvivacana-vibhajya-upapadārthaḥ eka eva hi pratiyogī bhavet
anayoḥ ayaṃ śuklo ’tiśayena iti na tṛtīyaḥ pratīyate
pratīyate nirdhāraṇārthena prathamasyaiva pratiyogitvāvagateḥ

“In the case governed by dual division, there is really only one comparator. In the expression ‘of these two, this one is whiter,’ no third thing is understood. What is understood is only that the first serves as the counter-term for determination.”

Now Abhinava gets very exact.

When we say, “of these two, this one is whiter,” the grammar may sound as though some extra comparative entity has appeared. But he says no — there is no third thing being understood there.

That is the key point.

There are only the two terms already given, and one is functioning as the comparator for the other. The comparative form does not generate some new independent “whiter-ness” hovering above both. It simply marks a relation of determination between the two.

That matters because it continues the same critique: grammatical comparison can sound like it adds content, but in fact it often only reorganizes what was already present.

So in the dual case, the structure is very spare:

• one thing is taken as the reference point,
• the other is said to exceed it in the shared quality,
• but nothing third is introduced.

This is a very clean observation, and it matters philosophically because Abhinava is still pressing against the tendency to hear “more” and imagine a separate ontological surplus. Here the “more” is relational, not substantial.

A simple way to feel it:

If I say, “between these two lamps, this one is brighter,” I have not introduced a third lamp called “brightness itself.” I have only used one lamp as the reference against which the other is judged.

That is all he is saying — but it is enough for his purpose.

So the line means:
in the comparative, the “more” does not create a new thing;
it depends on one term being measured against another.

No deeper extra meaning arises through stepwise comparison

na ca dviprabhṛtyapekṣā bhavati ekasya yugapat ekaikāpekṣā matā — iti
tasya krameṇa nādhiko ’rthaḥ kaścit

“And there is no dependence on two or more at once; the dependence of one upon each is understood separately. Therefore, through sequence, no further additional meaning arises there.”

Even when several comparators are available, the comparison does not produce some richer surplus by piling them together. One thing is still compared to one other thing at a time. The dependence is separate, not an all-at-once fusion that would create a new meaning-layer.

That is why Abhinava says: through krama, through sequence, no extra deeper meaning appears.

This matters because the whole discussion has been testing a subtle assumption:
that by moving from one comparison to another, or by stacking degrees of “more” and “most,” language might generate a real ontological surplus.

He says no.

The grammar can arrange, rank, compare, intensify.
But the sequential piling-up does not yield a new essence.

So this closes the example very cleanly. Comparative language remains relational and procedural. It does not break out of that frame by becoming more elaborate.

And that is why this matters for the larger argument. Abhinava is still undermining the instinct to hear terms of comparison — higher, beyond, more, most — as though they automatically disclosed a deeper layer of reality. Often they do much less than they seem to do.

A simple way to say the point:

you can compare one thing, then another, then another —
but the series of comparisons still does not create a new truth beyond the relations themselves.

So thus sequence can multiply comparisons; it does not generate a deeper content by doing so.