Dear Nina and friends,

thanks. I like to drop my earlier comments about a double negation.
The idea that there is a double negation in this passage is actually
incorrect.

I am thinking .thaana as a situation. It comes from the sentence:

Neta.m .thaana.m vijjati.
This situation is not found.

What do you think?

metta,
Yong peng.

--- In Pali@yahoogroups.com, Nina van Gorkom wrote:

> As for a.t.thaana, I think PTS refers to anavakaasa when saying
> impossible or not a chance. If you read the text carefully, it is
> a double negation. I do not have PTS with me now, but I think it
> simply resolves it and give it to the readers.
>
> A.t.thaanameta.m, bhikkhave, anavakaaso ya.m di.t.thisampanno
> puggalo ka~nci sa`nkhaara.m niccato upagaccheyya.
>
> This is NOT the position, monks, it is impossible that a person
> endowed with right views should regard any conditioned phenomenon
> as NOT permanent.

N: You have: This is NOT the position, but I think of the English. To
me it does not sound right. As to meaning it is like mettanet: it is
impossible, or it cannot happen that...

PTS also uses: it cannot come to pass,and this is the same as it
cannot happen that.