25-08-03 06:03, S.Kalyanaraman wrote:
> In Old Tamil, ajn~a_ni is defined as: 1. person without spiritual
> knowledge; 2. non-christian, pagan
>
> So, the only jn~a_ni-s are non-pagans, christians?
As the gloss comes from the Cologne dictionary, I don't think it can be
a silly mistraslation of "pagan" into a different cultural context. I
suppose the term (of Sanskrit origin) was adopted in this sense by Tamil
Christians. The first meaning given by the dictionary is the
etymological one: 'having no knowledge, ignorant' (= Skt. ajn~a:nin-).
Of course its derived use in a different language doesn't allow one to
project any Christian connotations back on Skt. jn~a:nin- 'knowing,
intelligent, wise'.
Piotr