The second hemistich of the "Rco aksare" -verse (I 164, 39) goes
like this:
yas tan na veda kim Rcaa kariSyati
ya it tad vidus ta ime samaasate ||
(Pada paaTha = without sandhi:
yaH; tat; na; veda; kim; Rcaa; kariSyati
ye; it; tat; viduH; te; ime; samaasate)
Griffith's translation:
Who knows not this, what will he do with praise-song?
But they who know it well sit here assembled.
It's interesting that the first line is in singular,
and the second in plural. What's even more interesting,
IMO, is that, if I'm not mistaken, the "ya it" could
equally well be sandhi for "yaH + it" (singular)
than for "ye + it" (plural).
The Cologne Digital Sanskrit Lexicon (CDSL) entry for
"it" (have no idea why it's "id"):
id ind. Ved. (probably the neut. form of the pronom. base %{i} see 3.
%{i} ; a particle of affirmation) even , just , only ; indeed ,
assuredly (especially , in strengthening an antithesis , e.g.
[EMAIL PROTECTED]@[EMAIL PROTECTED]@asat} , as the gods wish it , thus
indeed it will be RV. viii , 28 , 4 ;
[EMAIL PROTECTED]@[EMAIL PROTECTED]@debhuH} , the enemies wishing indeed to
hurt were in nowise able to hurt RV. i , 147 , 3). %{id} is often
added to words expressing excess or exclusion (e.g. [EMAIL PROTECTED] ,
every one indeed ; [EMAIL PROTECTED] , constantly indeed ; [EMAIL PROTECTED] ,
one
only). ******At the beginning of sentences it often adds emphasis to
pronouns , prepositions , particles (e.g. %>>>>[EMAIL PROTECTED]<<<<< , thou
indeed ; %<<<<<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>>>>> , if indeed , &c.) %{id} occurs often in
the R2ig-veda and Atharva-veda , seldom in the Bra1hman2as , and its
place is taken in classical Sanskr2it by %{eva} and other particles.*****
It's of course impossible to know whether making "ye" ambiguous
was the intention of Diirghatamas, but at least I thought for
a long time that the second line is also in singular, as I wasn't
aware that "viduH" is a plural verb form. In addition to that
verb form, the forms "ta" (singular: sa) and "samaasate" ( = they sit
together; I think the singular would be "samaaste") "of course" reveal
that the whole phrase is in plural. Perhaps by using the "ambivalent"
sandhi D. wants to convey some kind of idea of unity, or stuff...
(I guess especially native speakers of English have a hard time
not to think that "it" in "ya it" is *not* "it" in the English
meaning of that word.)
