Re: Kc 2

ps I referred to what the Burmese call the kalāp kyan as a Pali grammar text
predating the Kaccāyana.  Sorry, it is not a Pali text, it is Sanskrit.  The
name is Kātanta byākaraṇa by Sabbavamma, according to Thabyekan Sayadaw.

Ma Vajira

On Tue, Jan 12, 2010 at 7:53 AM, Ma Vajira <vajiranani@...> wrote:

> Dear Jim,
>
> Yes, Ashin Janakābhivamsa also calls this a saññāsutta in his Basic
> Grammar.
>
> He says that Attho akkharasaññāto raises the question, "What are these
> akkharā by means of which meaning is known?"  To answer that question,
> Akkhara p'ādayo ekasattālīsaṃ provides an answer: there are 41 akkhara
> beginning with a.  The udāharaṇa beginning taṃ yathā lists them.  This is
> the set of sounds/letters used in the tipiṭaka (suttantesu sopakārā).
>
> As far as this sutta establishing the use of akkhara as a name, he notes
> that there is no such sutta establishing the use of akkhara and vaṇṇa as
> names in a Pali grammar text predating the Kaccāyana (called the kalāp kyan
> in Burmese, sorry, I don't have the Pali spelling ready at hand).  That, and
> the fact that the word "nāma" is not present in the vutti, leads him to
> think that akkhara was already known as a term for the sounds/letters of a
> language, hence no need to define it as such, despite what is said in the
> Nyāsa and elsewhere, and that tena kvattho was probably added by later
> authors.  He gives the analogy that when a child is born, we can call him or
> her "child" without having to establish the use of the word "child" as a
> name or term.  Its meaning is evident.
>
> with metta,
> Ma Vajira
>
> On Mon, Jan 11, 2010 at 9:12 PM, Jim Anderson <jimanderson_on@...>wrote:
>
>> In my previous message I wrote:
>>
>> >The Nyāsa commentary on this sutta is about 8 pages long and I haven't
>> seen
>> > any explicit mention by the author of this sutta being a saññāsutta
>> > although he does treat akkhara as a  technical term (saññā).
>>
>> As my proofreading of the Nyāsa progressed through page 14, I came to the
>> following codanā and parihāro which addresses the very question of what
>> kind of sutta is Kc 2:
>>
>> athavā | idaṃ pana suttaṃ saññādhikāraparibhāsāvidhi suttesu katamanti
>> codanā || catubbidhaṃhi suttaṃ || ivaṇṇuvaṇṇā jhalāti eva
>> mādīni saññāsuttāni || itthipumanapuṃsakasañkhyamiccevamādīni
>> adhikārasuttāni || ayuvaṇṇānañcāyo vuddhīti evamādīni paribhāsāsuttāni ||
>> vamodudantānamiccevamādīni vidhisuttāni || tesu panidaṃ saññāsuttanti
>> parihāro ||
>>
>> The aurhor definitely identifies this sutta as a saññāsuttaṃ. There is
>> quite
>> a lot of subcommentary on the Nyāsa commentary on Kc 2 which I have hardly
>> touched. The Thanbyinṭīkā has 16 pages and the Niruttisāramañjusāṭīkā has
>> nearly double that at about 33 pages. I would expect to find a detailed
>> explanation of the four types of suttas in those ṭīkās.
>>
>> Jim
>>
>>
>>
>> ------------------------------------
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>>
>


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