Re: Sadd: some responses to Jim's comments

Dear Jim,

>I believe arguments have been made to show that the language of the
>Pali canon is not Maagadhii. I think K.R. Norman has presented such an
>argument but I can't tell you where you could find it. There have been
>a fair amount of speculation about the origins of Pali.
>

That is the general  view, but there is a certain amount of
sleight-of-hand involved. If you follow the (relatively late)
descriptions of Prakrit/Middle Indian/Middle Indo-Aryan dialects
given by Indian grammatical writers, what we call Pali does not have
all the features attributed to the dialect they call Maagadhii. It is
also true that some of the missing features are attested much earlier
in inscriptions, partly from the appropriate area of Eastern India.
However, there is nothing to say that this was the only dialect
spoken in Magadha.

Other dialects may have been spoken in the area close to the
present-day Nepalese border from which the Buddha came or indeed
through much of the kingdom of Kosala which appears to have been the
main focus of the Buddha's activities for a long time (note his
frequent residence at the capital: Saavatthi). Since these areas
were, it seems, incorporated into the kingdom of Maagadha during the
latter part of the reign of Ajaatasattu, they too would have properly
been called language of Maagadha in later times. This sort of thing
is quite normal. To reject it is the same as saying that only Scots
can be called English because it is descended from Angle whereas
standard English derives rather more from Saxon - true, but pedantic
and unnecessary.

We also have to note that we do not know what kind of variations
existed between the language of ordinary people and that of the
'upper classes'; it is not at all impossible that they spoke a
dialect, lacking some features of the dialect(s) spoken by ordinary
people.

Lastly, we should note that these were not written languages. If you
memorize speech, you generally memorize it in the dialect you
yourself use and would repeat it it in that dialect, not in a parody
of the original.

So it is not surprising that the Suttas show evidence of transmission
in various dialects before they were collected in the present form.

>Not sure what you mean by 'the second'. At any rate, I wouldn't equate
>the paa.li of paa.linaya to Magadhi. There could be some confusion in
>using the word Magadhi or Magadha or Magadhese (I'm not sure of the
>proper form) as some do not accept that the language of the Pali canon
>is Magadhi. Geiger speaks of Magadhisms as if Magadhi is foreign to
>Pali. I really don't know much about how these terms are used. I'm
>going by what it says in Sadd. Maybe we should be saying the language
>of Magadha instead of Magadhi.
>
>Best wishes,
>Jim
>

Pali as the name of a language appears to be first used in South-East
Asia around the 17th century, but it is never used in Pali writings
as the name of a language before that date and possibly not after. So
the language of the Canon has been called Maagadhabhaasaa or
Maagadhikabhaasaa at least since the time of Buddhaghosa and probably
quite a bit longer i.e. 1500 years or more. I think that is quite
long enough to establish it as the correct name ! Maagadhii is used
but relatively rarely and, as far as I know, only in works of the
second millennium A.D.

Perhaps we should call it Magadhika to remind ourselves that it is
based on a dialect used in the larger kingdom of Magadha.


--
Best Wishes,

Lance Cousins