Dear Susi,
First, to answer your main questions. Only volume 1 of the Dīghanikāya has been published to date, being launched in February this year. I believe the project will span at least a decade. The numbering of sections within a sutta differs from that of other editions and translations, which all differ from each other anyway. It probably makes no difference whether you choose your own numbering or adopt that of a given edition or translation.
And to elaborate. I am part of the advisor board to this project along with Richard Gombrich, Oskar von Hinüber, Peter Masefield, Toshiichi Endo, and P.B. Meegaskumbura, and others. At the last advisory board meeting and launch of volume 1 of the DN in February, Rupert Gethin and Bhikkhu Anālayo also attended. The project has benefited greatly from Alex Wynne's input, who is working alongside Prof. Somaratne and others.
The Dhammachai Tipiṭaka project has great resources, energy, and organizational skills and has gone about attempting to produce a critical edition of the canon with intelligence, including seeking the advice of the above scholars. Given their resources, etc., it is my impression that most members of the advisory board, including myself, agreed to participate in this project because they felt that something useful would come of it.
I believe the first volume (which benefited from the input of the advisory board, but is the product of the Dhammachai editorial team) attests to that. Of course, there are problems with it and it will be criticized for some decisions and aspects of methodology, but that would happen with any edition. The resulting edition is, I believe, quite decent and useful. They have utilized a relatively large number of manuscripts from diverse traditions; certainly more than most other so-called critical editions. Particularly useful will be the electronic edition through which one will be able to quickly access images of the manuscripts containing the variant readings recorded in the edition, with the wording highlighted for ease of reading.
If you cannot get a copy of volume 1 of the DN, then I can send you a scan of the Mahalisutta.
Regards
Mark Allon
-----Original Message-----
From: palistudy@yahoogroups.com [mailto:palistudy@yahoogroups.com] On Behalf Of Susanne Goetz
Sent: 6 June, 2013 8:26 PM
To: palistudy@yahoogroups.com
Subject: [palistudy] Standards in Sutta numbering (2011) revisited
Dear All,
I heard that the Dhammachai Tipitaka Project (Dhammakaya) has already finished the Dighanikaya of its critical Pali edition. Has anyone seen it, and, most important for me, does anybody know what system they use for numbering the suttas? Is it concordance-like (well, must be somehow in a critical edition), or/and did they (additionally) introduce a new numbering system?
About 10 days ago, I mailed to the (former?) coordinator of the Dhammachai Tipitaka Project, Bunchird CHAOWARITHREONGLITH <bunchird@...> (I once got an email from him in October 2010), but I haven't got any answer yet.
Would be glad if anybody could help me. I've taken up my work on a comparison of different translations of the Mahalisutta, and I wonder whether I will introduce my own system of numbering "translation units", or whether there has been a new index system introduced by the Dhammachai team which might be worth having a look at first.
I also attach previous mails about this topic. By the way, the link given beneath (http://www.bps.lk/olib/wh/img/paliabbreviationsystem.html ) doesn't work any more.
Kind regards,
Susi
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Von: Noah Yuttadhammo <yuttadhammo@...>
An: palistudy@yahoogroups.com
Betreff: [palistudy] Standards in Sutta numbering
Datum: Mon, 31. Jan 2011 04:24:14
Dear Friends,
Just wanted to get your thoughts on the numbering systems used in the various versions of the tipitaka out there. I just found out that accesstoinsight.org uses the PTS system, which is causing problems for the DPR, since, well, to put it simply, the PTS system is silly. Take, for example:
http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/an/an03/an03.100.01-10.than.html
http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/an/an03/an03.100.11-15.than.html
Clearly these are two different suttas, but Woodward has them as one. This is not the only example; it looks like other versions are united against the PTS's mistakes. So, I guess my question is, is there any rationale for favouring one system over another? Any good reason for Woodward's decision?
It would be nice to have a webpage somewhere with a standard system we could refer to.
Best wishes,
Yuttadhammo
Von: Khristos Nizamis <nizamisk@...>
An: palistudy@yahoogroups.com
Betreff: Re: [palistudy] Standards in Sutta numbering
Datum: Mon, 31. Jan 2011 11:20:48
Dear Ven. Yuttadhamma,
for what it's worth, my way of working with this, although it may seem cumbersome and pedantic, is, whenever I record a reference to any sutta or part of a sutta, I make sure I provide all the main 'co-ordinates', so to speak, that anyone is likely to use to locate a text or passage. So, e.g.,
AN 3.2.5.10 Paṃsudhovakasutta (AN 3.100 (i-x), PTS AN i.253); but in the case of MN, I prefer:
MN 143 Anāthapiṇḍikovādasuttaṃ* *(MN 3.5.1, PTS MN iii.258), although MN 3.5.1 (MN 143, PTS MN iii.258) would be more consistent.
Anyway, the point, in my humble opinion, is making it as easy as possible for others (and myself) to locate suttas / passages under any system. I think a single system is impractical, given what is already set in place in the bulk of the primary, secondary, and tertiary printed literature.
What *would *be very interesting and useful, I feel, is not a 'standard system' online, but rather, a comprehensive, detailed and accurate *concordance *between all the main systems that have ever been and are now being used. That way, someone who wants to quickly locate a scholar's reference to an otherwise unspecified passage at SN iii.5, but isn't lucky enough, e.g., to have a tool like DPR, can consult the concordance to discover that this passage can be found in the WTE under 3.1.1.1.1 Nakulapitusutta. (But here again, e.g., one can see how the PTS volume and page number system can be useful for quickly zeroing in on a specific section of the text.) So, my thought is not trying to force some impractical and impossible Single System, but to produce an elegant and comprehensive, easy to use Concordance between systems.
With best wishes,
Khristos
The first system, which is very logical and orderly and perhaps arguably sort of organic to the Nikaayas, is of course the one used, e.g., by the World Tipitaka Edition and DPR. Personally, I find it very useful including the PTS volume and page number co-ordinates (it seems that some scholars in recent years have taken to including line numbers as well), not because they have any absolute value, but just as a convenient way of pinpointing starts of suttas or particular passages in longer suttas (just as degrees of longitude and latitude bear absolutely no relationship at all to the geography of the Earth, but can help you find a particular spot, nonetheless).
Von: John Kelly <palistudent@...>
An: palistudy@yahoogroups.com
Betreff: Re: [palistudy] Standards in Sutta numbering
Datum: Mon, 31. Jan 2011 11:25:06
Dear Ven Yuttadhammo,
You raise a very good question. It's unfortunate the PTS numbering is so confused. For the Nikayas, clearly there is no issue for DN and MN. It is SN and AN that are problematic. The problem arises because the original Pali has no numbers and the various editions of the Pali (Be, Ce, and so on) use differing numbering schemes based on how their editors choose to separate the suttas.
I suggest DPR adopt the numbering system used by Sutta Central (suttacentral.net). I have been involved in this project and we have based our numbering on that used in the modern English translations by Bhikkhu Bodhi. For SN we use the numbering in his Wisdom Publications translation "The Connected Discourses of the Buddha", and for AN in his forthcoming translation "The Incremental Discourses of the Buddha", also to be published by Wisdom.
Sutta Central has all these numbers on its website and wherever a sutta number differs from that shown by PTS, the PTS number is shown in square brackets.
With metta,
John
Von: Nyanatusita <nyanatusita@...>
An: palistudy@yahoogroups.com
Betreff: Re: [palistudy] Standards in Sutta numbering
Datum: Mon, 31. Jan 2011 11:32:15
Hello,
Here is a page with the abbreviation system used in BPS publications. It gives the abbreviation scheme of the Pali Text Society (PTS) as given in the Dictionary of Pali by Margaret Cone as well as Ven. Bodhi’s system of abbreviating suttas as used in Connected Discourses of the Buddha:
http://www.bps.lk/olib/wh/img/paliabbreviationsystem.html
Regards,
Bh Nyanatusita
Von: "Ole Holten Pind" <ohpind@...>
An: palistudy@yahoogroups.com
Betreff: Re: [palistudy] Standards in Sutta numbering
Datum: Tue, 01. Feb 2011 10:51:12
Bh Nyanatusita,
The page is very useful. It shows that the system established by Helmer Smith and Dines Andersen in A Critical Pali Dictionary (= CPD) has left its mark. See CPD Epilegomena.
Regards,
Ole Holten Pind
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