Re: Dhammasattha literature

I have read a few books and articles that dealt with the phenomenon of
"Pali Dharmashastras" in Burma --and, as with so much of Burmese
Buddhism, the precedent seems to have been Mon.

What struck me as interesting about the genre is its complex relation
to the earlier Hindu material --i.e., appropriating from it, but also
adapting it to a Buddhist sentimentality & ethic.  This is also true
of a handful of Jatakas that relate directly to (i.e., appropriate
liberally from) Hindu mythology --I once read a rather dull article on
the latter subject as well.

In any case, I had thought that the language used in the Burmese
Dharmashastras was "just barely Pali" --i.e., significantly different
from canonical Pali-- but it could be that this observation was based
on a single example (or was simply wrong).  In any case, it may be
that the CPD considered them to be outside of Pali literature as they
defined it (a sheer guess on my part); in any case, the genre is not
obscure to western scholarship, and (on the contrary) the British took
a keen interest in it for the same reason that they took an interest
in _The Laws of Manu_.

So much of the Sk. Dharmashastra tradition is either primarily or
exclusively devoted to the valourization of the caste system, that it
would be interesting to compare how similar themes are reflected in
the Burmese Pali idiom (or if they are excluded).  I recently spent a
few minutes with a major set of Sk. Dharmashastra translations, and
set the tome down as --despite my detached interest-- the content of
the text was about as horrifying to me as a cannibal cookbook.

I'm sure that some of the most infamous examples of the genre are
familiar to members of this list from various conferences with
"Hegemony" in the subject-heading ("And if a low-caste man should hear
the vedas, let his ears be cut off!  And if he should dare recite the
vedas, let his tongue be cut off!").

E.M.