---
type: Concept
bundle: mimamsa-dharma
bundle_version: 0.10.0
id: apurva
title: Apūrva
iast: Apūrva
devanagari: अपूर्व
description: 'The unseen after-potency by which a completed, momentary rite produces its remote result; the Bhāṭṭa answer to how a sacrifice now yields heaven later; NOT merit-points, NOT a karmic bank balance, NOT divine reward.'
darshana:
- Pūrva-Mīmāṃsā
text_source: Mīmāṃsā Sūtra 2.1.5
tags:
- apurva
- mimamsa
- unseen-potency
- bhatta
not:
- term: 'merit or merit-points'
  why: 'Merit-language imports a scorekeeper tallying good deeds. Apūrva is an impersonal causal link internal to the act, posited to explain how a finished ritual can still produce an effect; there is no ledger and no one keeping it.'
  instead: 'Render apūrva as the unseen after-potency that carries an act to its later result, not as merit.'
- term: 'a karmic bank balance'
  why: 'The banking image suggests a stored quantity drawn down over time. Apūrva is posited specifically as the otherwise-missing causal connection between a past act and a future fruit, not an accumulated balance.'
- term: 'divine reward'
  why: 'Mīmāṃsā is non-theistic about ritual efficacy: the result follows from apūrva by the Veda''''s own order, not because a god chooses to reward.'
related:
- /concepts/phala.md
- /concepts/yaga.md
- /concepts/niyoga.md
timestamp: '2026-07-08'
okf_version: '0.2'
license: CC BY-SA 4.0
---

# Apūrva -- अपूर्व

**Not:** merit-points, a karmic bank balance, divine reward

## What It Actually Means

A sacrifice is performed and finished in a day, yet its fruit (svarga) is enjoyed much later, perhaps in another life. What connects the vanished act to the distant result? Kumārila''s Bhāṭṭa school posits apūrva, "the not-before," a new unseen potency generated by the act that persists until it ripens. It is inferred, never perceived, and it is the linchpin that makes the whole economy of enjoined action intelligible without a rewarding god.

## School Divergence (Bhāṭṭa / Prābhākara)

For the Bhāṭṭas apūrva is a real unseen force, the efficacy stored by the act. Prabhākara reframes it: the primary meaning of the injunction is the binding to-be-done (niyoga, kārya), and apūrva is understood in terms of that enjoined action rather than a separately stored potency.

## Audience Metaphor

A struck bell keeps ringing after the strike; the sound now is caused by a blow already past. Apūrva is the rite''s after-ring: the act is over, but an unseen vibration carries its effect forward to a result that arrives long after the striking hand has stopped.

## Citations

1. Mīmāṃsā Sūtra 2.1.5 and the apūrva adhikaraṇa -- see [references/mimamsa-sutra.md](../references/mimamsa-sutra.md)
2. Kumārila, Tantravārttika on apūrva -- see [references/tantravarttika.md](../references/tantravarttika.md)
