Re: What's does the "anta" in Suttanta mean?

thanks for reminding me, and for the reference to § 23 of your Analysis.

By the way, Klaus in his article on sutta and suttanta states that, different from what is now generally accepted, sūtra originally seems not to have been used for short texts. He examined that with respect to the śrautasūtras.

I am not familiar with these texts. How old are they?

The Śrautasūtras as a whole are thought of as being the oldest Sūtras, but there are also Gṛhyasūtras being older than the latter. Klaus examined both. As a date he gives 600 to 200 BCE.

He says that the older Sūtras have the elaborate style, whereas the short Sūtra style can be observed in the younger vedic and in nearly all vedic and philosophical Sūtras.

He, therefore, assumes that sūtra in the sense of short text is a later development, whereas originally it referred to texts which were compiled out of various sources, and are thus comparable to a thread spun from individual fibres .

The Patimokkha or Sutta is like a thread or string consisting of fibres of many short rules, which, like the Brahmanical suttas need to be explained by a commentary, the Suttavibhanga. It makes good sense to call it a sutta.

Agreed.

Thus there would be no problem for using sutta (derived from sūtra, not sūkta) for Buddhist dhamma texts.

Yes, there is no problem, but it is good to be aware that the word sutta in the Pali Canon, except perhaps for the general designation sutta as one of the nine angas of the Buddhavacana, was used with reference to the Patimokkha, while the individual discourses of the Buddha in the Nikayas were referred to as suttanta. In commentarial Abhidhamma texts there are the suttantabhājaniya method and the abhidhammabhājaniya methods of analysis.

according to Klaus the word sutta in the beginning probably was used for a collection of Dhamma texts,

Does he take sutta as one of the nine angas to be referring to this collection?

He discusses that. von Hinüber thinks that sutta in the list of nine stands for the Pātimokkha. Klaus accepts this interpretation eventually for the list of 4 (1-3, and 8 of the list of nine), but rather thinks that sutta in the list of nine also refers to the Suttas in the Suttapiṭaka (here he is not completely convincing to my opinion). The single reference for sutta outside the list of nine aṅgas, where sutta definitely does not refer to the Pātimokkha (DN II 123,30ff.; AN II 167,33ff.), but to the discourses, according to vHinüber is late, i.e. ca. 30 or 50 years after the death of the Buddha. This is refuted by Klaus, because he thinks this passage (the four mahāpadesas) does not make sense as a text compiled after the death of the Buddha.

Perhaps the usage of sutta as a collection of suttantas is a later development than the usage of sutta with reference to the Patimokkha?

Since sutta is used rarely, and when, mostly as a reference to the Pātimokkha, or in the list of nine aṅgas, and only once in the DN as a word that does not refer to the Pātimokkha (see above), it seems to be not as old an expression for the discourses; since, furthermore, titles of texts (as names of rules in the Pātimokkha) are probably younger (they may also have been changed by copyists), since they differ, the usage of sutta or suttanta in titles is not of much value. Thus it seems that sutta for the Pātimokkha is fairly old, whereas mātikā for the Pātimokkha is younger. May be the latter came into use with the growing use of the word sutta for the discourses? (only a guess).

Best,

Petra

Best,

Petra

Am 05.12.2014 um 04:03 schrieb Nyanatusita nyanatusita@... [palistudy]:

Dear Petra,

To avoid confusion (which probably was originally caused by von Hinuber's article “Das Pātimokkhasutta der Theravādin”): there is no Pātimokkhasutta in Pali literature. In BHS there is the Prātimokṣasūtra, but there is no equivalent to this in the Pali. The text is either referred to as Pātimokkha or Sutta, but not as Pātimokkhasutta. See the discussion in the book of which I sent the link in the reply to Bryan yesterday, Introduction § 23..
Best wishes,
Bhikkhu Nyanatusita

On 12/5/2014 1:55 AM, Petra Kieffer-Pülz kiepue@... [palistudy] wrote:

According to von Hinüber, Kleine Schriften, vol. I 165ff. (can be seen via Goggle books), in the earliest layers of the canon sutta is used exclusively for the Pātimokkhasutta, whereas with reference to other texts than the Pāt. suttanta is used. In the later layers the difference between these two terms is blurred.

Best,

Petra

Am 04.12.2014 um 21:04 schrieb 'Jim Anderson' jimanderson.on@... [palistudy]:

This quote from the Ledi Sayadaw's Niruttidīpanī should help solve the
"-anta" mystery:

<< Mahāvuttinā padānaṃ ante gata, jāta, anta saddā āgamā honti.

Rūpagataṃ [ma. ni. 2.133] vedanāgataṃ [ma. ni. 2.133], saññāgataṃ [ma. ni.
2.133], gūthagataṃ [ma. ni. 2.119], muttagataṃ [ma. ni. 2.119], diṭṭhigataṃ
[mahāva. 66], atthajātaṃ [pārā. aṭṭha. 1.paṭhamamahāsaṅgītikathā],
dhammajātaṃ, suttanto [kathā. 226], vananto, sammākammanto, micchākammanto
iccādi.

Āgamasandhirāsi niṭṭhito. >>

According to the above, gata, jāta, and anta at the end of words are
augments (āgamas) and therefore could be construed as pleonastic without any
meaning. The same question came up many years ago with responses from Lance,
Ole, and myself.

Jim

----- Original Message -----
From: "Petra Kieffer-Pülz kiepue@... [palistudy]"
<palistudy@yahoogroups.com>
To: <palistudy@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: December 4, 2014 10:03 AM
Subject: Re: [palistudy] What's does the "anta" in Suttanta mean?

Dear Bryan,

I contacted Konrad. Let's see whether he has a scan for us.

Best,
Petra

Am 04.12.2014 um 15:44 schrieb Bryan Levman bryan.levman@...
[palistudy]:

>
> Hi Lance, Petra and all,
>
> Margaret Cone has anta as meaning "completion, summation of" in final
> compound (as well as pleonastic). This would fit with the Upaniṣads as
> the completion of the Vedas (because they come at the end of the Vedas)
> and the summation of the Vedas (because they summarize the Vedic message).