Lesson 20: Usage of Parasmaipada
Present and Future Participles

Usage
The present participle is used for action that is in progress at the time of the action of the finite verb (while x is happening, y happens). Which is to say that its action is simultaneous with that of the finite verb, regardless of whether the latter is in the past, present, future, optative, etc. For example:
  • अहम् अश्वं ताडयन्तं नरम् अपश्यम् । “I saw a man beating his horse.”
    • “beating” (ताडयन्तं) is simultaneous with the past “saw” (अपश्यम्)
  • अहम् अश्वं पुनस् ताडयन्तं तमेव ताडयिष्यामि । “I will beat him (when he is) beating his horse again.”
    • “beating” (ताडयन्तं) is simultaneous with the future (ताडयिष्यामि)
  • अहम् अश्वं ताडयन्तं नरं ताडयेयम् । “I would beat a man (who is) beating his horse.”
    • “beating” (ताडयन्तं) is simultaneous with the optative (ताडयेयम्)
The reason we call this participle the “present participle” is because: 1) it is built from the present stem, and 2) it is present relative to the time of the finite verb. It is not so called because its action necessarily happens in the present. Likewise, the future participle is so called because: 1) it is built from the future stem, and 2) its action is future relative to the time of the finite verb. For example:
  • अहम् अश्वं ताडयिष्यन्तं नरम् अतुदम् । “I struck the man (who was) about to beat his horse.”
    • “about to beat” (ताडयिष्यन्तं) is future to the past “struck” (अतुदम्)
Apart from this one difference in time (futurity versus simultaneity), everything said below in reference to the present participle applies also to the future participle. Their usage is identical. There are several things to note:
I. Main Functions: Simultaneity, Agent identification, Causality
As you might have gleaned from the examples above, the present participle can express more than just simultaneity. Specifically, two other meanings are especially common: identifying an agent and expressing a causal action. They are worth noting in particular because their translations differ slightly, e.g.:
  • अश्वं ताडयन् स एवम् अवदत् ।
    “While beating his horse, he spoke thus (i.e., as follows).”
  • तत्राहं तुभ्यं स्पृहयन्तं नरम् अपश्यम् । तम् प्रति गच्छ ।
    “I saw the man who longs for you over there. Go to him!”
  • हरिम् पश्यन् नरो मोक्षं लभते ।
    “In seeing (= because of seeing) Hari, a man obtains liberation.”
In the latter two cases, the force of the participle is not on simultaneity. The second example uses the participle to highlight an action’s agent, translated with the relative pronoun, “who/what/which” (i.e., I saw the one “who longs” for you; meaning: I saw that guy, not someone else). The third example uses the participle to express the cause of the finite verbal action (i.e., the act of seeing Hari is an immediate cause of obtaining liberation), translated by “in x-ing” or “because of x-ing.” Being subordinate clauses, participial clauses in these three meanings can therefore replace relative clauses with the same meanings: यदा/तदा (for a simultaneous action), यद्/तद् (to identify an action’s agent), यतः/ततः (to express a causal action):
  • यदा स अश्वम् अताडयत् तदा स एवम् अवदत् ।
    “When he beat his horse, he spoke thus....”
  • यो नरस् तुभ्यं स्पृहयति तम् अहं तत्रापश्यम् ।
    “I saw the man who longs for you over there.”
  • यतो नरो हरिं पश्यति ततः स मोक्षं लभते ।
    “Because he sees Hari, a man will obtain liberation.”
Thus, remember “while x-ing,” “who x-es,” and “in x-ing” as translations for the present participle.

(You needn’t worry about it yet, but for the sake of reference: this second function (identifying an agent) will instead identify an action’s patient when the participle is passive. In which case, its translation would be “who is being x-ed.” See Lesson 21.)
II. The Present Participle is a Verbal Adjective
The present participle is a verbal adjective in both form and function. It is verbal in showing:
  • pada — the -अन्त् / अत् stem is distinctively Parasmaipada (Ātmanepada present participles are treated in Lesson 21), hence the present participle above is formed, ताडयन्त्, because its root, तड्, is P.
  • voice — P. participles are active (agent-agreeing). For example, ताडयन्तं above can only agree with its agent, नरम् and तम्, and never its patient (अश्वम्). Passive (patient-agreeing) participles will, like passives in general, be in the Ā. (Lesson 21).
  • transitivity — active participles of transitive roots can govern a direct object in the accusative, as ताडयन्तम् governs अश्वम् above.
And the present participle is adjectival because, like all adjectives:
  • it agrees with the noun it’s modifying in gender, number, and case: e.g., the present participle above, ताडयन्त्, takes its m.s.acc. form (ताडयन्तम्) to show that it agrees with नरम् and तम्, which are m.s.acc.
III. An adjective’s case connects it with its noun. It ‘means’ nothing.
The adjectival character of the present participle cannot be stressed enough. Like all adjectives, the only reason the present participle takes a particular case is to show us how to read it (i.e., to show us with which noun to construe it). Its case has no independent ‘meaning’ in itself and therefore cannot be translated. Thus, ताडयन्त् is in the m.s.acc. form (ताडयन्तम्) only so that we know to read it with नरम् and तम्—i.e., so that we know that it is the man who is doing the beating (and not “I” or, with further disambiguation, the horse). The accusative case in ताडयन्तम् doesn’t have a translatable meaning. Take another example:
  • राज्यं त्यजता भर्त्रा सह देवी वनं गच्छति ।“The queen is going to the forest with her husband, (who is) abandoning his sovereignty / kingdom.”
Here the present participle, त्यजता (“abandoning”), is in the m.s.ins. only to show us that it agrees with भर्त्रा (“with husband”). It has no ‘instrumental’ value in itself, so it can never be translated, “by abandoning” or “because of (his) abandoning” as if it were a verbal noun. Remember that the “x-ing” form the Sanskrit present participle represents is always our adjective (“running man”), never our verbal noun (“Flying is fun”).
IV. Identify the main clause, then the participial one
Because you can’t translate the case of present participles, you should first make sense of the noun the participle is modifying before attempting the participle and the rest of its clause. For example, in:
  • अहम् अश्वं ताडयन्तं नरम् अपश्यम् ।
we cannot begin to make sense of अश्वं or ताडयन्तं in our translation until we know the noun with which ताडयन्तं is agreeing. That noun (नरम्), however, will be in a particular case based on the syntactic role it is playing in the main clause (here नर is acc. as the direct object of अपश्यम्). Which means that it is easier in the beginning simply to identify and translate the main clause first, and then to attempt the participial one. In the present case, we have quite clear SVO syntax:
  • अहम् अश्वं ताडयन्तं नरम् अपश्यम् । “I saw a man.”
leaving us with the participial clause:
  • अहम् अश्वं ताडयन्तं नरम् अपश्यम् । “a man beating his horse”
Although ताडयन्तम् could grammatically agree with either अश्वं or नरम्, both the sense and the syntax will decide the issue in favor of नरम्. In Deshpande you can count on regular syntax: objects precede the verbs / participles upon which they depend (e.g., अश्वं ताडयन्तम्) and adjectives, including participles, precede the nouns they qualify (e.g., ताडयन्तं नरम्). As you can see from the above, the participial and main clauses will always overlap in the noun they share in common:
  • अहम् (( अश्वं ताडयन्तं नरम् )) अपश्यम् । 
In order to better identify and analyze these clauses, try underlining the main clause and circling the participial one, at least to begin with.
V. The present participle does not serve as a sentence predicate
Finally, as Deshpande notes, the one adjectival function present participles lack in Sanskrit is predication. That is, ordinary adjectives in Sanskrit, as in English, may serve as the predicate, e.g.:
  • “The king is old,” नृपो वृद्धो भवति ।
where the m.s.nom. adjective, “old” (वृद्धः), is not just describing a noun (“king,” नृपः); it is being predicated of the subject (“is old” वृद्धो भवति). Present participles cannot be used in this way as sentence predicates. Although in English we may say, “Rāma is going,” we cannot do the same with a present participle in Sanskrit (never: * रामो गच्छन् भवति). Here, the present tense would be sufficient:
  • रामो गच्छति । “Rāma goes / is going.”