Re: Translations of Pāli texts

Dear Chris,

A few infos on the Sri Lankan situation. The translation which was done
based on the sixth council version started in 1956 ("Buddha Jayanti
Tripitaka") and was done by various monks and was printed alongside the Pali
text. Unfortunately, it is extremely hard to understand for the average Sri
Lankan, to the point that it is unreadable (lot of Sanskrit-isms) -
scholarly language, sometimes just a Sanskritized Sinhalese transliteration
rather than translation.

Since then various people have translated portions of the Tipitaka into
Sinhala, mostly short pieces. One translator whose translation is much more
readable and reached a wider audience is A.P de Soyza, you can find his
translations on metta.lk <http://www.metta.lk/tipitaka/>

The Buddhist cultural center in Colombo recently came out with a simplified
version of some of the old Buddha Jayanti Tripitaka translations, but those
are still rather challenging to the average reader. It seems the pressure to
"know" has increased in the last 10-15 years.

Especially in the last few years Ven. Kiribathgoda Nyanananda started to
translate the core Sutta Nikāyas into a much simpler Sinhalese which has, as
far as I can tell, had a great impact. He earned a lot of criticism for his
simple rendering but definitely attracted a lot of attention from lay people
who, for the first time it seems, are able to understand what they have been
chanting. Reminds one almost of the time around the reformation in Europe.
His organization is called
mahamevna.org<http://www.mahamevnawa.blogspot.com/>- I think some of
their translations (Majjhima, Samyutta) are even available
online.

There has always been a certain reluctance towards translations in the
monastic community, as it was expected from everyone to master Pali and
leave the texts as they are - and inform the lay people through sermons
(bana). We will probably see more translations surface, especially now that
it became clear how big a knowledge-vacuum there is and also seeing the
positive appreciation of lay people towards those few organizations who push
reading and studying the Tipitaka, especially the suttas (Sutta &
Commentaries, esp. Vism seem to be the absolute favorites in the Sri Lankan
community, less interest in Vinaya and Abhidhamma studies).

Hope this helps as a starting point,

metta,

Lennart

References:
http://www.buddhistcc.net/Tripitaka.asp
http://tipitaka.wordpress.com/
http://www.aathaapi.net
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Kiribathgoda-Gnanananda-Thero/132442786791504
http://www.scribd.com/doc/32507708/The-Sipiritual-BioGraphy-of-the-Founder-Mahamevnawa-Monastery


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