Re: the 41 sounds

Jon,

>Just having another look at L.1, I agree that 'sounds'
>is a better description than 'alphabet', for the
>reasons you have given.

I thought that it would help to think of Pali more as a spoken
language than a written one. The two terms 'va.n.na' and 'akkhara' can
both be translated as 'sound' or 'letter' but the Saddaniti makes it
quite clear that the terms are referring to sounds.

Although language is for the most part conceptual, there are aspects
of it that touches on dhammas in the ultimate sense such as sadda
(ruupa) originating from citta (cittasamu.t.thaana, cittaja). There
are some interesting notes on the production of (articulate) sounds
just before the first sutta. eg. "Of the one thinking and reflecting
(vitakkayato vicaarayato) thus:'I will say this', a sound is produced
by the striking of the clung-to earth element with the arisen earth
element born of citta in this and that place (of articulation)." This
passage is a little out of my depth and so my translation is probably
off the mark.

>Just for fun, could you parse the first sutta?  It's
>got me intrigued.  Hope this is not jumping the gun
>too much, but it might help give us a feel for the
>language as we go along.

1. appabhutekataaliisa saddaa va.n.naa.

1. (The) forty-one sounds beginning with 'a' (are the)
     va.n.na-s.

The old grammarians of Sanskrit and Pali wrote their sutras or suttas
in a very concise way which are often difficult to decipher without
the help of the commentary. For the first sutta the vutti expands it
into something a little more comprehensible as follows:

Bhagavato paavacane a-kaarappabhutii ekacattaaliisa saddaa va.n.naa
naama bhavanti.

So in the sutta the 'a' before ppabhut- represents the first sound of
the 41 letters. You will note in the vutti 'a-kaara-'. Here, '-kaara-'
(item) is used to specify one particular sound.

'pabhutii' is an adjective meaning 'beginning with'. It has the plural
inflection 'ii' and modifies 'saddaa' (sounds). The double p
in -ppabhutii is best explained by knowing the Sanskrit form
'prabh.rti'. The prefix 'pa' equals the Skt. 'pra'. When a word like
pabhuti is preceded by an element ending in a (usually) short vowel
like 'a' the 'p' is doubled and it helps to think of the second 'p' as
representing the Skt. 'r' in 'pra'. This kind of doubling is very
common in Pali. The long ii at the end of appabhutii has been elided
in the sutta due to sandhi (euphonic combination). The 'e' of eka- has
caused ii to disappear. The first chapter of the Suttamala volume of
the Saddaniti is entitled the Sandhikappa which also includes the
suttas on the Pali sounds. There are at least 160 sandhi rules in it
and we will look at some of them later on. The word
'appabhutekataaliisa' is actually two separate words: appabhutii
ekataaliisa.

'ekataaliisa' means forty-one. eka (one) + taaliisa (forty). The usual
word for forty is 'cattaaliisa' but I suppose Aggava.msa wanted
something a little shorter and chose the one with the 'cat' lopped
off.

'saddaa' is the nom. pl. form of 'sadda' (sound) which is a masculine
word.

'va.n.naa' is also a masculine word and has the same inflection as
saddaa. There is no copula verb in the sutta but it can be understood
from the vutti. The Sanskrit counterparts of sadda and va.n.na are
"sabda and var.na.

Best wishes,
Jim