Re: Another Sakuṇagghisuttaṃ question

In agreement with Bryan:

neuter plural nouns in the nom. and acc. can take one of two alernative
endings: -ā or-āni.  The -ā ending is identical with the masculine nom.
plural. (Note also how the masculine acc. sg. is -aṃ, just like the neuter,
and the rest of the cases are identical.  This closeness of masculine and
neuter forms is common also in other Indo-European languages: it's found
also in Ancient Greek; but, as in Pāli, the feminines are markedly
different in form.)

So, interestingly, the neuter noun, if it takes the plural -ā ending is
treated as masculine, hence cattāro. Which sort of makes sense, in a way.

You'll find the same situation with mahābhūta, 'great element' or 'great
existent', which is neuter: the texts have both cattāro mahābhūtā and
cattāri mahābhūtāni.

With metta,
Khristos

On 15 October 2012 13:27, Bryan Levman <bryan.levman@...> wrote:

> **
>
>
> Dear Steve,
>
> Although -paṭṭhāna is normally neuter, per the dictionary, here it is
> being treated as a masculine, nominative plural apparently, as the ending
> is - -ānā, rather than -ānāni, as you might expect. Accordingly cattaro is
> in the nom. masc. plural form. A quick search with the DPR shows that the
> Tipiṭaka has both examples of cattāro satipaṭṭhānā and cattāri
> satipaṭṭhānāni.
>
> Hope that helps,
>
> Bryan
>
> ________________________________
> From: "scbeadle@..." <scbeadle@...>
> To: palistudy@yahoogroups.com
> Sent: Sunday, October 14, 2012 9:14:36 PM
> Subject: [palistudy] Another Sakuṇagghisuttaṃ question
>
>
>
> One more student question about SN 47.6 Sakuṇagghisuttaṃ (PTS S V p. 147):
>
> Near the end of the sutta is the phrase (in the nominative case) "cattāro
> satipaṭṭhānā", which has been translated as "the four frames of reference":
>
> http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/sn/sn47/sn47.006.than.html
>
> I can see how there might be differing translations of "satipaṭṭhānā". But
> I am more concerned with the preceding adjective "cattāro", which should be
> simpler, because it just means "four".
>
> The noun "satipaṭṭhāna" is neuter. But the neuter nominative form of
> "catu" is "cattāri". So why is "cattāro" (the masculine form) used instead
> of "cattāri" (the neuter form) in this phrase ?
>
>
> Would appreciate any suggestions here
>
> - Steve
>
> [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
>
> 
>


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