Dear Bryan
How are you?
You asked:
“am I correct that you are translating viññāṇaṃ here as "knowable"? Where does this translation come from?
Yes, you are correct. This translation comes from viññāṇaṃ because I translated it in line with the intention of the commentator who defined it in terms of viññātabbam.
And, I did not want to leave viññāṇaṃ untranslated so as to avoid being asked why I did not translate it.
You asked:
“Does not the ti after viññātabban place "it is known uniquely" in quotes, rather than "knowable"?”
No, Bryan. You have asked a wrong question again.
‘Ti’ in ‘viññātabbanti’ comes from ‘iti’ and is not a quote, but is a reason indicator in this context. Please see verse 1188 of Abhidhānappadīpikā, an ancient Pāli dictionary and thesaurus, whose verses are memorised by heart by young monks who study Kaccāyana Pāli grammar by also memorising its suttas in Monastic schools and universities in Myanmar.
That is why I translated ‘viññātabbanti’ as “…because it is known uniquely.”
If ‘ti’ were a quote for ‘viññātabbam’, then ‘viññātabbam’ would have become a word to receive definition - as it was the case in Kevatta Sutta Ţīkā where Ţīkā author needed to explain the term ‘viññātabbam’.
But, we all know that Kevatta Sutta Aţţhakathā was commenting on the term ‘viññāņam’ that appears as ‘viññānam anidassanam…’ in the verse in the paragraph 499 of Kevatta Sutta.
Bryan, you are certainly having a serious problem with the syntax of Kevatta Sutta commentary Pāli line “viññātabbanti viññāṇaṃ nibbānassetaṃ nāmaṃ.”
By contrast, as “Knowable” is a name for nibbāna, I placed it in inverted commas which are not related to ‘ti’.
Bryan, you also wrote:
“PED describes viññātabba as a gerundive, not a gerund. The dictionary uses the abbreviation "grd." which in the front matter abbreviations means gerundive (see http://dsal.uchicago.edu/dictionaries/pali/frontmatter/abbreviations.html). It is not just the PED which calls viññātabba a gerundive = future passive participle. So does Whitney (§961-967), Geiger (§199) and Collins (p. 110-112).”
Thank you, Bryan, for your further clarification about the abbreviation “grd”.
Unfortunately, whether it was a gerund or a gerundive, the mistake of PED, Whitney, Geiger and Collins will remain as long as they insist on ‘viññātabba’ as a future passive participle only.
Learners of foreign languages need to be sensitive to the context in which a word is used.
As such, the ‘tabba’ suffix must also be interpreted in the context in which it is used.
I have provided four uses of ‘tabba’ as found in the explanatory verse of the sutta 545 in Padarūpasiddhi.
I wrote the following in my post ‘Four Suttas on ‘tabba’ in Padarūpasiddhi in English’.
“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”.”
Bryan, did you see “viññātabbo vinicchayo”?
I wrote the following in my third comment on the explanatory verse.
“3. The suffix can convey the meaning of being worthy or appropriate.”
The source reference of viññātabba given in PED has the same context in which the third use of ‘tabba’ is described in the explanatory verse for sutta 545 of Padarūpasiddhi, namely the context of being worthy or appropriate.
The context in which “viññātabbo vinicchayo” is used is NOT the one for a future passive participle as PED and others claimed.
Bhikkhu Ñāņamoli has translated Sammohavinodanī into English with the title ‘The Dispeller of Delusion’ published by Pāli Text Society. He translated “viññātabbo vinicchayo” as ‘Thus should the definition be known’ at the end of paragraph 229 in ‘The Dispeller of Delusion’.
Bhikkhu Ñāņamoli was a tireless English monk scholar who translated many important Pāli commentarial works including Visuddhimaggo. No doubt that he must also have consulted Pāli English Dictionary of PTS like all of us do, yet he did not treat ‘viññātabbo’ as a future passive participle as you kept insisting on, Bryan. He treated ‘viññātabbo’ as a simple passive predicate in line with the third use of ‘tabba’, which conveys the meaning of being worthy or appropriate.
Bryan, did you see the example translation I gave in my comment for the third use of ‘tabba’?
“Padarūpasiddhibyākaraņam uggaņitabbam.”
Padarūpasiddhi grammar should be studied”.
Please compare my example translation above with Bhikkhu Ñāņamoli’s translation of “viññātabbo vinicchayo”.
Bryan, you also asked:
“I don't understand what a "passive predicate" is.”
So, now, you are asking me to teach you English as well.
I have learnt the concept of predicate in Year 6 English class at the middle school in a market village in Myanmar. In fact, I have learnt all the basic forms of English sentences in Year 6 English class in that village.
I never thought that I would have to teach someone the concept of predicate I have learnt in my Year 6 English class. Now, the unthinkable has happened to me in Canberra in Australia- the unthinkable being explaining of the concept of predicate to you!
Bryan, a predicate is what comes between the subject and the full stop in a complete sentence and tells something about the subject. It tells what the subject is, or have, or does such and such.
Bryan, you also asked:
“Could you please explain in what way it is different from a future passive participle outlined above?”
Since a future passive participle can tell something about the subject, it is also a predicate.
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The point I have been trying to make here is that treating of ‘tabba’ only as a future passive participle is a mistake, the type of mistake done by PED, (Whitney, Geiger and Collins, according to you), but avoided by Bhikkhu Ñāņamoli in his Pāli Text Society publication.
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As I wrote above, ‘tabba’ must be interpreted in line with the context in which it is used. You did mention the passages translated by Collins from Saddanīti written by Aggavamsa of Myanmar which show different contexts in which ‘tabba’ is used.
You also asked:
“Is there a dictionary you would recommend which contains their grammatical meaning?”
To my knowledge, only in Tipitaka Pāli-Myanmar Dictionary can technical terms of Monastic Pāli grammar texts be found. But, you could also try to look up the multi-volume Critical Pāli English Dictionary, which I do not have, by the way.
Bryan, you also asked, regarding Sutta 546: ņādayo tekālikā (“The suffixes starting with ‘ņ’ are the ones that have three tenses”.):
‘What is a "suffix(es) starting with ṇ"? How do we know that he is referring to -tabba and -anīya?’
Bryan, if you recalled, I wrote the following in my first reply.
“Please read carefully the following quotes from Padarūpasiddhi, the commentary on Kaccāyana, the earliest Pāli grammar text.”
The suttas are originally from Kibbidhānakappo in Kaccāya Pāli grammar.
Kibbidhānakappo has 5 Chapters. All the suttas dealing with the suffixes starting with ‘ņ’ and including ‘tabba’ and ‘anīya’ in sutta 540 among them are in Chapter 1.
The first sutta of Chapter 2 in Kibbidhānakappo is sutta 550 “ņādayo tekālikā” and is listed as sutta 546 in Padarūpasiddhi.
So, Bryan, if you want to know what the suffixes starting with ‘ņ’ are, you need to consult the Chapter 1 of Kibbidhānakappo in Kaccāyana Pāli grammar. A copy of it can be found in the Añña category in Chaţţha Saňgāyanā CD from Vipassanā Research Institute, where you can also consult Padarūpasiddhi as well as Abhidhānappadīpikā, which I mentioned earlier in this message.
As a matter of fact, if you enrolled in a Monastic Pāli School or University in Myanmar to study Pāli language, you will be required to study first all the suttas of Kaccāyana Pāli grammar by memorising them. Then, the monk tutor will make you follow and understand the meaning of each sutta you have memorised step by step. In teaching you, the monk tutor uses one of the instruction manuals known as Kaccāyananissayo prescribed by the monastery. Then, you will be required to carry out what is known as word-form calculation on every example word in Kaccāyana Pāli grammar.
The process of word-form calculation is the same as proving of theorems in Euclid’s geometry. There are Kaccāyana suttas that prove the form of each Pāli word by linguistically analysing and reassembling it.
Kaccāyana suttas serve as premises for the procedure of proving and justification of a Pāli word form. The linguistically proved and justified word form is known as form finalisation in Myanmar monasteries, which is the translation of the word ‘padarūpasiddhi’, word-form accomplishment.
When students of Pāli have digested and mastered all suttas of Kaccāyana Pāli grammar and have become skilful in word-form calculation, they have reached the level of Pāli learning where they will be allowed to study commentaries on the Kaccāyana Pāli grammar. The most popular commentary on Kaccāyana is Padarūpasiddhi, ‘A Treatise on Word-form Accomplishment’.
Yes, only after Pāli students have mastered the suttas of the Kaccāyana Pāli grammar, they are regarded as being qualified to learn its commentary, Padarūpasidhi.
In fact, Pāli language tutors are instructed to NOT teach Padarūpasiddhi to a student who has not mastered the Kaccāyana Suttas. That is because Padarūpasiddhi assumes that its learners have already mastered and past the subject of Kaccāyana.
Regarding Sutta 546 in Padarūpasiddhi: ņādayo tekālikā (“The suffixes starting with ‘ņ’ are the ones that have three tenses”.),
You asked “How do we know that he is referring to -tabba and -anīya?”
Bryan, I apologise to you for having imposed the four suttas of Padarūpasiddhi on you.
I initially thought that you were a Pāli scholar who is able to do independent research in the advanced Pāli texts such as Padarūpasiddhi as well as other commentaries and sub-commentaries. I got this wrong impression about you because you were tackling Kevatta Sutta Commentary and Sub-commentary.
Only now, based on your questions, I realize that you are still a novice learner of Pāli and a spoon-fed one at that.
Sorry, Bryan, I had to call you a novice learner because I found you to be unable to draw conclusions by using even only a small set of given premises, let alone doing large-scale independent research.
Padarūpasiddhi is studied to have deeper understanding of the suttas of the Kaccāyana Pāli grammar and for easier word-form calculation and accomplishment. The treatise provides convenient word-form calculation by re-arranging the Kaccāyana suttas relevant to the targeted Pāli words.
Thus, as ‘tabba’ and ‘anīya’ are the targeted Pāli words for word-form calculation, the relevant suttas of the Kaccāyana Pāli grammar are rearranged and placed together strategically as suttas 545, 546, 547 and 548 in Padarūpasiddhi, which are differently arranged and numbered in the original Kaccāyana Pāli grammar.
Now, I will answer your question: “How do we know that he is referring to -tabba and -anīya?”
The answer can be found in sutta 548 of Padarūpasiddhi where abhibhavitabbho’ and ‘abhibhavanīyo’ are given as example words for word-form calculation. And, these words are defined as ‘abhibhūyate, abhibhuyittha, or abhibhūyissati’ by using sutta 546. In other words, sutta 546 allows abhibhavitabbho’ and ‘abhibhavanīyo’ to be in one of the three tenses in line with the context in which they are used.
So, the readers of Pāli need to interpret the abhibhavitabbho’ and ‘abhibhavanīyo’ according to the time when the action of the verb takes place such as in the past or in the present or in future.
Please pay attention to the term ‘or’ in the above paragraph.
Regarding Sutta 548: Kammani abhipubbo, abhibhūyate, abhibhuyittha, abhibhūyissateti abhibhavitabbho kodho paņḍitena, Bryan, you also wrote:
“I was not aware that a -tabba suffix should be understood in all three tenses, present, past and future. So per this sutta, viññātabba, would mean "It is known, it was known, it will be known."”
More correctly speaking, ‘viññātabba’ would mean "It is known, or it was known, or it will be known", I must add.