Dear Yong Peng and friends,
It is true that the word bhuupaalo is very uncommon in
the canon. Clearly Lily de Silva, author of "Pali
Primer" chose it over maore common words for king,
because it is a regular masculine -a stem noun, which
the others aren't.

I think the Pali Primer is an excellent starting book
for people very new to Pali. Its two biggest
limitations are that it doesn't use texts from the
canon in its exercises and that its explanations for
more complex grammatical material in the latter half
of the book is very superficial. However, its great
strength is that it is very unintimidating to the
beginner because it introduces material very gently -
the first 8 chapters just cover the 8 case declensions
of the masculine -a stem nouns, one at a time!

I found the book very useful as a starting point to
going onto a more advanced (and more interesting)
book, and as this list knows, I have been diligently
working through all the material in the
Gair-Karunatillake "New Course in Reading Pali", and
posting my answers to the group. Having almost
finished with that, I now feel ready to tackle
Warder's "Introduction to Pali".

Keep up the good work, Yong Peng. The beauty of a
list like this is that we have mutiple threads for
different levels of experience and interest.

John
--- "Ong Yong Peng <ypong001@...>"
<ypong001@...> wrote:

> Dear Ven. Kumara, Nina and friends,
>
> thanks. I have checked and found that there are
> several other words
> for king: raaja, bhuupati, etc. all are masculine
> gender.
>
> I am running in small chunks (3 or 4 sentences each
> day) so that we
> can concentrate on just those sentences, their
> structure and grammar
> as well as the component words each day. This allows
> us to slowly
> compiled our notes, get involved, proactive, and
> really master Pali.
>
> I used to go through one or two lessons/chapters in
> one day each
> week, and I found that I hardly remember much in the
> next week. Also,
> because I have to keep referring back, I tend to
> miss out many
> important stuff. I find that by doing a bit each
> day, there is less
> stress, and I can afford to read through the entire
> lesson each day
> until I complete the whole exercise for the
> lesson/chapter.
>
> I am following the Pali Primer this time, so I have
> to be faithful
> and plan to go through every exercise in the book to
> maximise all the
> exposure I can get. Along the way, I will add more
> things in addition
> to "Pali Day by Day" and "Sutta Translation" that we
> are going
> through. However, I encourage everyone to get
> involved and better
> still run a separate thread to cater to another area
> of Pali learning.
>
> metta,
> Yong Peng
>
> --- Kumaara Bhikkhu wrote:
> > Nina, if you run a check on that word "bhuupaalo"
> in the CSCD,
> you'd also find that it is a very rare word. It is
> only
> (occasionally) found outside the Tipitaka.
> >
> > I like this day-by-day Pali lessons that Yong Peng
> is offering to
> beginners. However, I do hope he could be choosy
> about the
> vocabulary. More work, yes. But, better to share
> useful Pali.
> >
> > metta,
> > kb
> >
> >
> > At 02:19 AM 01-02-03, nina van gorkom wrote:
> > >Dear Yong Peng,
> > >A good idea for everybody, also catching up on
> vocabulary. I
> stumbled a bit
> > >on bhuupaalo, protector of the earth, it is
> somewhat unusual. I
> like this ,
> > >because we can just look everyday and get
> something without
> strain. The less
> > >grammar and vocabulary we have to look up later
> on, the more
> agreeable will
> > >be the reading.
> > >Thank you,
> > >Nina.
>
>

__________________________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Mail Plus - Powerful. Affordable. Sign up now.
http://mailplus.yahoo.com