Hi Jou,

> Does anyone here know of any scholars that have applied the

Linguistic

> theory of Semantic Shift and Change [that words have additional

meanings

> added over time and often loose their origninal meaning] to words in

the

> Paali texts? I have asked the Paali Text Society and they said they
> don't know any, which I was shocked to hear.

I don't know of any either, but you might be interested in the
writings of Eivind Kahrs (or E.G. Kahrs), a Sanskrit lecturer at
Cambridge University, England. I'm currently reading his _Indian
Semantic Analysis_ Cambridge, 1998. He also has a long article in the
Journal of the Pali Text Society (Vol. XVII) on _Exploring the
Saddaniiti_.

> The ones I have considered are below. We have records that the

Buddha

> gave some of the definitions suggested below as the originals, the
> others come from the comparative study he seems to have suggested

for

> his teaching that I have practiced for a while.
>
> Word: x
> Time frame: Suggested use by the Buddha -> subsequent uses, one

being

> the majority use by Buddhaghosa's time -> present day use

One of the methods I use is to look up the word's root along with its
meaning which can be found in the several lists of Pali roots that are
available. Sati is derived from the root 'sar' which is listed (among
other 'sar' roots) in the Saddaniiti as "sara cintaaya.m" (to think).
Jhaana is derived from either "jhe cintaaya.m" or "jhe dittiya.m" (to
burn). The only other roots having the same meaning of 'cintaa' is
'cint' and 've.n' according to Aggava.msa's list. You can also compare
the roots of different lists and Paa.nini's Sanskrit Dhaatupaa.tha.
Paa.nini is considered to be from the 4th century BCE or earlier so
his list is particularly valuable as we can get some idea of the
original meanings of the roots as generally understood during that
ancient period. The roots in the Pali lists for the most part have
their counterparts in the Sanskrit list.

Best wishes,
Jim