On 12/25/08, Jon Fernquest <bayinnaung@...> wrote:

> Dear Mahinda, Ardavarz, and all;
>
> Thank you Mahinda for that note about the Baalavaataara.
> I didn't realise how important it was.
> Since Pali was a central piece of monastic education these recent
> books and articles by Pali scholar Justin McDaniel at UC Riverside
> might be of use at least in learning how the Thai Sangha has handled
> learning Pali in the past:
>
> 1. Gathering Leaves and Lifting Words: Intertextuality and Buddhist
> Monastic Education in Laos and Northern Thailand, Seattle: University
> of Washington Press, August, 2008
> http://www.amazon.com/Gathering-Leaves-Lifting-Words-Histories/dp/0295988487
>
> 2. "The Curricular Canon in Northern Thailand and Laos," Manusya:
> Journal of Thai Language and Literature Special Issue 4, 20-59, 2002.
>
> http://www.facultydirectory.ucr.edu/cgi-bin/pub/public_individual.pl?faculty=2320
>
> I also deposited a copy of Justin's unpublished PhD dissertation on
> Pali nissaya at the Siam Society in Bangkok but it is not on the
> shelves yet.
> For those interested in Pali verse and meter,
> Collin's book also has a good summary on this,
> and I also came across an interesting review
> of Norman's revised translation of the Theragaathaa
> that the PTS published in 2007 in the Bulletin of
> SOAS 71, 3 (2008).

Dear Jon,

Many thanks for all this bibliographical info. They are of much
interest, even to one who is no longer in the academic enterprise. In
fact I placed an order for Collin's grammar, because you (or was it
Jim?) said that it is based on Saddaniiti. I imyself began the study
of Pali with the Sinhala version of Buddhadatta's New Pali Course.
Later, I learned a lot by consulting the commentaries.

Mahinda