Dear John, & all,

John Kelly wrote:

> Let's have more Pali on this list, and less polemics - and
> always great respect for each other. I'm sure there are
> plenty of other lists available where people can argue about
> doctrine to their hearts content.

Hear, hear! In fact there are presently 2236 Yahoo groups
related to Buddhism, where people can argue about doctrine
to their heart's content. Please, moderator, can we have our
*Pali* list back?

There is a problem though. On 3rd June, Stephen commented to
the now departed Bruce:

> I'm sorry to hear that you are leaving because there is not
> enough Pali language material but if you look at the
> objectives of the group, you will see that discussions of
> other matters apart from just Pali language are deemed
> acceptable.

And there's the rub! The present list of discussion topics
reads:

> 1. Tipitaka and sutta study
> 2. Pali language and literature
> 3. Theravada Buddhism
> 4. Samatha (Tranquillity) and Vipassana (Insight) meditation
> 5. Sutta study tools and methodology
> 6. Tipitaka translation theory and practice

It seems to me that this list covers much too broad a range
for the kind of specialist forum indicated by the name
"Pali-L". By now it ought to be apparent to all that when
discussions depart from the topic of Pali, the diversity of
strongly held views among list members almost always results
in the generation of more heat than light.

With this in mind, I should like to invite members to submit
their views on a proposal to amend the above list, with the
aim of ensuring a more focussed discussion in the future. In
particular, I would suggest that items #3 and #4 be dropped,
on the grounds that they belong in the category of subjects
for which there is already good coverage among the Buddhist
e-mail forums.

As an alternative to the above list of discussion topics I
propose the following:

1. Pali language: its history and grammar
2. Approaches to the study of Pali
3. Pali literature
4. Translation theory and practice as applicable to Pali texts

What say ye? Any suggestions, comments, criticisms? And
would the list-owner agree to the use of the Yahoo poll
feature for ascertaining the members' views on this?

Best wishes,

Dhammanando