Dear Mahinda and Florent,

Mahinda, thanks for your explanation, particularly on Pali metre,
which I am not familiar with. However, just to point out, 'mahaa-'
was in the original question.

"Citte mahaakaru.nayaa paha.taavakaasaa
Duura.m jagaama viya tassa hi vatthuta.nhaa."

I would rewrite in prose as (again, without considering the preceding
text):

"Viya tassa vatthuta.nhaa citte mahaakaru.naaya paha.taavakaasaa hi
duura.m jagaama."
"Just as his desire for wealth, obstructed by the great compassion of
the heart, has indeed gone far."

Florent, we can still look at the preceding text if you want to.

metta,
Yong Peng.

--- In Pali@yahoogroups.com, Mahinda Palihawadana wrote:

Going by what you have quoted from the text book, it looks as if the
prose order of the words in this stanza is: "tassa vatthu-ta.nhaa hi
citte mahaa-karu.nayaa apaha.ta-avakaasaa duura.m jagaama viya". This
could (literally) mean: "His greed for wealth (vatthu) was as if it
had gone far (away), space (avakaassa) (for it) having been taken away
(denied) by the great compassion of the heart."

The correct punctuation would be "mahaakaru.nayaa'paha.taavakaasaa..."
apahat.a is PP from apaharati: take away. Literally 'taken away' but
actually, 'denied'. 'vatthu' means both 'field' and 'wealth'. The
particle 'hi' is more or less a gap-filler and can be left
untranslated. (Or, it can be translated as 'indeed', if one so wishes.)