---
type: Concept
bundle: mimamsa-dharma
bundle_version: 0.10.0
id: apauruseyatva
title: Apauruṣeyatva
iast: Apauruṣeyatva
devanagari: अपौरुषेयत्व
description: 'The authorlessness of the Veda: the doctrine that the Veda has no author, human or divine, being an eternal, uncreated relation of word and meaning; NOT divine revelation, NOT scripture written by God, NOT prophecy.'
darshana:
- Pūrva-Mīmāṃsā
text_source: Mīmāṃsā Sūtra 1.1.27
tags:
- apauruseyatva
- mimamsa
- authorless
- veda
not:
- term: 'divine revelation'
  why: 'Revelation presupposes a divine mind that reveals. Mīmāṃsā''''s core claim is that the Veda cannot have been composed by any mind, human or divine, because any authorial contact would make it fallible and datable. Authorlessness, not divine authorship, is the ground of its authority.'
  instead: 'Render apauruṣeyatva as the authorlessness (no author at all) of the eternal Veda, never as divine revelation.'
- term: 'scripture written by God'
  why: '''''Scripture'''' carries the model of a text an author (God) wrote and a community canonized. The Veda for Mīmāṃsā is beginningless word-and-meaning, apprehended and transmitted by seers who did not compose it.'
- term: 'prophecy'
  why: 'Prophecy is a message a person receives from the divine and announces. There is no announcer and no divine message-sender in the Mīmāṃsā account; nothing is being communicated by anyone.'
related:
- /concepts/sabda-nityata.md
- /concepts/autpattika.md
- /concepts/svatah-pramanya.md
- /concepts/dharma.md
timestamp: '2026-07-08'
okf_version: '0.2'
license: CC BY-SA 4.0
---

# Apauruṣeyatva -- अपौरुषेयत्व

**Not:** divine revelation, scripture written by God, prophecy

## What It Actually Means

Apauruṣeyatva, "not-from-a-person-ness," is Mīmāṃsā''s foundational epistemic move. Because dharma is known only through the Vedic word, that word must be a flawless means of knowing; and a text with an author could always be doubted, since the author might err or lie and the text would have a beginning in time. Mīmāṃsā therefore holds the Veda eternal and authorless: the connection of word and meaning is itself beginningless, and the ṛṣis are seers who apprehend and transmit the Veda, not poets who compose it. This is the sharpest single point where Mīmāṃsā must not be read through the category of revealed scripture.

## Audience Metaphor

The truths of arithmetic were not written by anyone; two and two made four before any mathematician, and no author''s reliability is at stake in trusting them. Mīmāṃsā treats the Veda like that: authorless, and so never exposed to any author''s fallibility, true the way an eternal relation is true rather than the way a message from a speaker is trusted.

## Citations

1. Mīmāṃsā Sūtra 1.1.27-32 on the authorless Veda -- see [references/mimamsa-sutra.md](../references/mimamsa-sutra.md)
2. Kumārila, Ślokavārttika (codanā and śabda sections) -- see [references/slokavarttika.md](../references/slokavarttika.md)
