Dear Bryan
How are you?
Thank you for your feedback and, I was impressed by your admission that you had no experience with grammatical suttas.
You are not alone in that regard. Many years ago, Sarah, the owner and moderator of Dhamma Study Group (DSG), posted a page from an Abhidhamma commentary translation published long, long time ago by Pāli Text Society (PTS). When I read it, I noticed an oddly wrong translation of a concept, and I exclaimed “What the…!”
As I know the original Pāli word of the oddly mistranslated concept, I consulted Pāli-English Dictionary from PTS.
Surprise, surprise! Professors T W Rhys Davids and Willam Stede had also defined the same Pāli word with that odd mistranslation.
No wonder that the translator of the Pāli commentary in question made the same mistake in his translation!
And, successive editors of Pāli Text Society still keep the odd mistranslation in both the commentary translation and the Pāli-English dictionary.
What discovery and lesson did I get from the above scholarly mishap? The compilers of Pāli-English Dictionary, the translator of the Pāli commentary in question and successive editors of Pāli Text Society had not studied the Monastic Pāli grammartical works. If they had, they had not done as adequately as they should have.
The offending Pāli word was a technical term of the monastic Pāli grammar texts. Do not ask me which? I do not recall it as it was nearly 10 years ago.
Bryan, you wrote:
“I am now quite confused now about your translation”.
Bryan, what was your mother tongue? Was it English? If it was, you need to cultivate the habit of reading carefully what other people wrote.
1: The first major reason for your confusion about my translation was that you did not read my first answer carefully.
I wrote the following in my first answer:
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Yes, I have another reading in light of my Pāli resources that have enabled me to offer the following.
“viññātabbanti viññāṇaṃ nibbānassetaṃ nāmaṃ.”
“It is called ‘Knowable’ because it is known uniquely; it is the name of nibbāna.”
So, you are taking issue with my translation of ‘viññātabbam’ as ‘it is known’.
My translation is in line with the Monastic Pāli grammar texts.
Please read carefully the following quotes from Padarūpasiddhi, the commentary on Kaccāyana, the earliest Pāli grammar text.
…<snip>…
Bryan, after reading and understanding the above 4 suttas from Padarūpasiddhi, you will able to justify my translation of ‘viññātabbam’ as ‘it is known’.
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In the above excerpt, did you see that I mentioned twice how I translated ‘viññātabbam’ as ‘it is known’.
They appeared in these two statements.
1: So, you are taking issue with my translation of ‘viññātabbam’ as ‘it is known’.
2: Bryan, after reading and understanding the above 4 suttas from Padarūpasiddhi, you will able to justify my translation of ‘viññātabbam’ as ‘it is known’.
Yet, in your reply to my First Answer, you kept thinking and writing as though I translated ‘viññānam’ as ‘it is known’ by writing the following statements.
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In you post you said
>“Vinnyaatabbanti vinnyaanam nibbaanassetam naamam.” >“It is called ‘Knowable’ because it is known uniquely; it is the name of nibbaana.”
Where you translated vinnyana? (instead of viñña?a?) as "it is known uniquely."
My question was where the reading vinnyana? in the passive sense of "it is known" comes from -
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So, I was forced to deny in my Second Answer to your feedback as follows.
1: Bryan, I did not translate vinnyānam as “it is known uniquely”.
2: No, I did not translate viññānam as “it is known uniquely”.
And, I was also forced to write the following.
“By commenting as if I translated what I did not, and by asking a wrong question consequently, you certainly seemed to have a serious problem with the syntax of Kevatta Sutta commentary Pāli line “viññātabbanti viññāṇaṃ nibbānassetaṃ nāmaṃ.” ”
2: Bryan, the second major reason for your confusion about my translation was your misunderstanding of the syntax of Kevatta Sutta commentary. Namely and specifically, you misunderstood the Pāli syntax “viññātabbanti viññāṇaṃ”.
In your first query posted to Nina, you wrote the following.
“viññātabbam is the gerundive (future passive participle) of vijanati”.
And, in your feedback to my first answer, you wrote as follows.
“viññatabbam as future passive participle of vijanati is from the PED under vijanati:
"-- grd. viññatabba (to be understood)"
Bryan, it was unfortunate that Pāli students all over the world have recourse only to the Pāli-English Dictionary from PTS, which is still a very good authority, but now needs serious major updating and enlargement.
Yes, PED describes “viññatabba” as a gerund, but not as a future passive participle, though.
When I checked PED, the source reference of viññātabba is given as Vibhaňga Aţţhakathā on page 46, commonly known as Sammohavinodanī.
So, I consulted Sammohavinodanī and found “viññātabbo vinicchayo”.
Surprise, surprise! Pāli-English Dictionary from Pāli Text Society made another mistake.
“Viññātabbo” in the Pāli syntax “viññātabbo vinicchayo” is not a gerund, let alone a future passive participle.
In the context of the given source syntax, “viññātabbo” is a passive predicate complete with an object (kamma) in the form of a subject.
Now, let’s look at the Pāli syntax “viññātabbanti viññāṇaṃ” from Kevatta Sutta commentary.
You considered “viññātabbam” in the above Pāli syntax to be a gerund (a future passive participle) by looking up the Pāli-English dictionary from PTS.
As I discovered, ‘viññātabba’ quoted in PED was not a gerund, but a passive predicate in the context of the source reference.
Thus, you had a chance to repeat the same mistake as did by PED.
No wonder, then, that you were now quite confused about my translation!
That was because I treated “viññātabbam” as a passive predicate in the Pāli syntax “viññātabbanti viññāṇaṃ” and translated it in line with the context of Kevatta Sutta commentary. You know what my translation was. Go back and read it _ very carefully, this time!
Now, I will briefly explain the 4 suttas of Pad
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