Hi OP:
I didn't know that the word "seven" is a semitic borrowing.
I am wondering if you do not mind listing (a few pieces of) evidence
for the above claim.
Thank you in advance.
tadao
--- Ole Holten Pind <oleholtenpind@...> $B$+$i$N%a%C%;!<%8!'(B
> <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 M?ller, 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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Tadao Miyamoto, Ph.D.
GSICS, Tohoku University
Local committee of Brain Connectivity Workshop 2006
e-mail: BCW2006@...
URL: http://www.idac.tohoku.ac.jp/BCW2006/