What about the phrase that comes immediately afterwards:
phassa-paññatti.m paññaapessati
I'd seen one or two of these before, where the verb and the object
are the same word. (I just learned from a friend of mine on another
list that this is called "cognate object construction.")
Very literally, I translate it as:
paññaapessati = causative (-pe-) future (-ss-) i.e. "it will cause to
be known"
phassa-paññatti.m = "contact-knowledge"
But why this sophisticated construction?
Why not just say: "When there is eye, when their is form, when there
is eye-consciousness, there will be contact?"