SV: Muulakamma.t.thaana
From: Ole Holten Pind
Message: 1595
Date: 2005-12-18
<Even "the four noble truths" are problematic in this way, as they are, in
fact, "the four facts known to the noble ones" (i.e., nobility does not
inhere in the truths, but rather those who know them are dubbed "arya",
whatever that means...>
Yes, indeed. Cf. my posts on this problem. Arya/ariya "noble" is
problematic. The Danish linguist Herman Møller, the inventor of the laryngal
theory of Indoeuropean Reconstruction suggested in 1906 that the word is
related to a semitic root denoting free people as opposed to slaves. I tend
to think that this is correct. It is probably a semitic loan word, like the
word for seven.
<In the context of texts on meditation especially, I think that one needs a
very fine sensitivity to the use of English words, and a very philosophic
level of rigour in evaluating the Pali texts to begin with. I recently read
an argument that "Jhana" should be translated as "ecstacy" as per the Greek
_ekstasis_ --but this rendering would have had one set of problems for
Rhys-Davids in the 19th century, and another for ourselves.>
I agree. I would like to add that some of the translations of crucial texts
on meditation like the satipatthana present quite a few problems that
inevitably cause problems for its exegesis. I have already mentioned the
adverb parimukha.m and its interpretation in the commentarial lit. At the
time of the composition of Vajracchedika it had been turned into an
adjective qualifying smrtim. This interpretation is already en vogue in
Pa.tis. which indicates that no one knew how to interpret parimukha.m any
longer.
OP
OP
E.M.
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