Dear Bryan,

thank you for your confirmation and explanations about gerunds and absolutives.

I note that you further describe participles as being used as adjectives, this is well understood from similar usage in English. I just hope people do not get confuse with gerundives, participles and adjectives.

metta,
Yong Peng.

--- In Pali@yahoogroups.com, Bryan Levman wrote:

You're right, the normal way to describe a word like vanditvaa is as an absolutive. It is the "absolute" form of the verb as it is indeclinable - one form is used in all situations. It is usu. translated as "Having [verb]ed" or "After [verb]ing", or "When s/he had [verb]ed." but can also be used in a passive mood, if the sentence is passive.

A word like gamana "going" I would call a gerund, which is a verbal noun, used as a noun as e.g. "Going to temple is fun". "Going (to temple)" is the subject of the sentence with going in the nominative (devagaha.m gamana.m) and is acting more as a noun for that reason. So yes I agree that gamana is a gerund and gantvaa is better called an absolutive.

> Forms like vanditvaa, "having praised", do we call them gerunds, or should we call them absolutives instead? If we define gerunds strictly as "verbal noun", then words like vanditvaa are hardly used as nouns in Pali.
> One example is 'gacchati', we have 'gantvaa' meaning 'having gone', and we also have 'gamana' meaning 'going'. In this case, 'gamana' fit the description of a gerund better than 'gantvaa'. Do you agree?