From: James Anderson
Message: 5076
Date: 2018-08-09
Dear Ven. Kumara,
According to Rūp-v 378, ‘āruppa’ (Skt. ārūpya) is derived from ‘arūpa’ by adding the taddhita affix ‘ya’ (ṇya) which stands for ‘bhāva’ (state, existence, being). The anubandha or indicatory letter ‘ṇ’ lengthens the negative prefix ‘a’ to ‘ā’. The meaning of this derivative would be: the formless state, formlessness, immateriality.
I’m not sure if arūpa can have the same meaning or is it just the adjective ‘formless’?
Best wishes,
Jim
p.s. just saw Bryan’s more detailed post.
From: palistudy@yahoogroups.com <palistudy@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: August 8, 2018 3:44 AM
To: Pali Study <palistudy@yahoogroups.com>
Subject: [palistudy] āruppa & arūpa
Dear all,
The āruppa in the early texts has clearly been changed in the commentaries to arūpa, as in arūpakammaṭṭhāna and arūpajjhāna. I can accept that rūpa = ruppa. But what's the justification for changing the prefix ā to a?
With the new word, we assume āruppa means "formless", but could it possibly mean something esle?
with metta,
Kumara Bhikkhu, ven.