Re: Mmd: introductory verses

Hi Rett,

Thank you for weighing in with your take on the syntax of the second
verse.

> First off, I agree with Lance that muniva.n.nitabuddhim is a
> bahuvrihi, to be taken together with kaccaayanam. That leaves
> everything from assa in the first pada onwards to be explained.

In my response to Lance I admitted to making some mistakes. I think
the syntax of the first part up to but not including 'assa' is now
fairly straightforward and we're all in agreement. And as you say its
the syntax of the remaining part of the second verse that still needs
explaining.

> I don't think this is much different than what Jim was already
> thinking.The main difference is that laddhopadesam becomes the
object
> of the genitive assa Kaccaayanassa. To put it in the form of an
> anvaya, the reading I'd try might look like this:

I'm not sure what you mean by an 'anvaya'. Is this something you
picked up while learning Sanskrit?

> assa kaccaayanassa laddhopadesam avalamba
> aha.m paara.mparaabhatavinicchayaniccha[ya]~n~nuu
> tena katassa mukhamattam karissa.m
>
> Relying on the received-teaching of this Kaccaayana
> I, knowing the investigations handed down in succession,
> shall compose an introduction to what was composed by him.

Your rendering sounds plausible to me but I think it's worth
considering some other possibilities too. I thought of one where
laddhopadesam could be the final part of the preceding compound which
could then be translated as:

. . . <resting/relying> on the instruction obtained/received from
knowers(?) of the investigations handed down in succession . . .

The words: vinicchaya, nicchaya~n~nuu, and upadesa all look like
specialized words to me and I'm not sure what they are referring to.
'nicchaya~n~nuu' (which I have found no where in a CSCD search) could
be referring to the author(s) of a category of treatise(s) called
vinicchaya(s). Instead of the possessive relation of 'assa
kaccaayanassa' to 'laddhopadesam', could it not also stand on its own
as a point of reference? ie. "concerning this Kaccaayana, I shall
compose an introduction to what was composed by him, relying on . . .
in succession." I'm not sure if Vajirabuddhi intended 'mukhamatta' as
the title of the work or a generic term (an introduction). I noticed
something similar in the opening verse of Dignaaga's
Pramaa.nasamuccaya where he has only 'samuccaya.h' which Hattori took
as a truncated form of the book's title and inserted the 'Pramaa.na-'
part in front and in brackets.

> This takes the word order of the verse as being rather jumbled, but
> since the words kaccaayanassa and laddhopadesam both start the
second
> halves of their respective lines, I think the recitation rhythm
could
> support their being syntactically connected.

Interesting. That's an observation I wouldn't have thought of myself.

I think the next thing I'll do is to look for definitions of 'upadesa'
and 'vinicchaya' in my dictionaries and on the CSCD.

Best wishes,
Jim