Questions tagged [pali-language]
A dead Indo-European language indigenous to the Indian subcontinent. It is important to Buddhists and scholars of Buddhism because many of the earliest Buddhist texts are written in the Pali language e.g. the Pali Canon. It is also used during chanting and ritual in some Buddhist traditions.
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Is Pali the Buddha's native tongue? [duplicate]
Here is another non-essential question born from a dead thing. Is Pali the native language of Buddha's birth town? Apparently the Shakyas are bilingual (according to wiki), and they derived from a ...
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How do you write "Seeking the House Builder" in Pali script?
I'm looking to get a tattoo and have these word written in Pali. Can you help me with how to write this in Pali script?
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What is the proper translation of the pali "Kāyassa bhedā paraṁ maraṇā" to english?
The pali phrase "Kāyassa bhedā paraṁ maraṇā" is found in many suttas.
Bhikkhu Sujato translates this as "when their body broke up, after death"
Bhikkhu Bodhi translates this as &...
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Is there a true contradiction between SN 5.10 and SN 22.85?
It is said by the bhikkhuni Vajira:
“Just as, with an assemblage of parts,
The word ‘chariot’ is used,
So, when the aggregates exist,
There is the convention ‘a being.’
SN 5.10
However, in the ...
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How should we understand the phrase "saccato thetato"?
Inspired from another question, I went looking for translations from the pali on suttacentral where pali experts have used the english word 'real.'
SN 22.85 as translated by Bhikkhu Bodhi
“But, ...
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How were large Pali words perceived / understood originally?
I asked How to break Pali compound words? in which I tried to also ask the question I am asking here, but the answers focused mostly on how to break down Pali words (which I also find important).
But ...
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How to break Pali compound words?
Looking at the Pali Tripitaka, many of the words are really long:
Ucchedavādo
anuppādadhammā
evaṃsukhadukkhappaṭisaṃvedī
micchādiṭṭhikammasamādānā
sambodhiparāyaṇo’’ti (btw, what does that ’’ mean, I ...
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Is Nibbana a "Realization"?
I read the following on the internet:
But the core of the Realization has nothing to do with causality,
otherwise Nirvana would still be subordinate to Samsara, while in fact
Nirvana is famously ...
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What does Bhikkhu Bodhi mean by "mind objects"?
From the Six Sets of Six MN 148.
English
Dependent on the mind and mind objects, mind-consciousness arises. The meeting of the three is contact; with contact as condition there is feeling; with ...
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Kalama Sutta only about Kilesas?
I found an explanation of Kalama Sutta in a website which is said to be from a Tipitaka teacher in Sri Lanka. Is Kalama Sutta only about Kilesas?
Kālāma sutta is only to be applied for Lobha-dosa-...
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Does a Pali thesaurus exist?
When seeking to refine my mental maps of the world in any domain of expertise to more precisely differentiate between similar terms, I have found a thesaurus to be an invaluable tool.
The domain of ...
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What Pali term most closely represents the concept of "inner conflict"?
A little context to describe what I am looking for and why I am looking for it:
It is my strong intuition that "suffering" is a label that we give to a phenomenon
that, upon deeper ...
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Sanskrit versus Pali and Nagarjuna
I have recently been learning Pali, and have heard that Sanskrit is somewhat similar. With a decent knowledge of Pali, is it possible to read Nagarjuna, for instance, perhaps with just some of the ...
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Which language will get you deeper into Buddhism, Pali or Sanskrit?
I seem to have read that the "original" or "oldest" Tripitaka was written in Pali, but at the same time the Sanskrit language is much older than Pali. How do Sanskrit and Pali ...
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What is the meaning and origin of “Namo Tassa Bhagavato Arahato Samma Sambuddhasa”?
What is
the meaning word by word
the meaning of the whole sentence
the origin
of “Namo Tassa Bhagavato Arahato Samma Sambuddhasa”?
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Canki Sutta (MN95) Buddha's use of "Bharadvaja" as a term of address
In the Canki Sutta (MN95) the Buddha talks to a Brahmin youth called Kapathika, but addresses him as "Bharadvaja". Does this litterally mean "supporter of the cow pen"? What might ...
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Where are the most common places to find Pali/Buddhism Anki decks in 2021?
Anki, is by far the most popular "spaced repetition tool" to enable long term retention of learned material in 2021.
It does so using a scheduling algorithm which prompts the user to recall ...
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What are the most common ways to enable keyboards to type Pali characters in 2021?
Given the wide variety of possible solutions from keyboard firmware to operating system specific solutions, I'd like to leave the question wide open in order to discover which solutions are actually ...
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Did the Buddha invent any words?
A person told me that the Buddha coined certain words as part of his teachings. I don't remember which words, but perhaps "samadhi" was one of them.
Is there any evidence the Buddha invented ...
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What is the meaning of the word 'Emptiness' as it was used in the oldest texts?
Want references/excerpts and inference pertaining to the references & etymology for the designation[s] of "Emptiness" as it is used in the Pali Sutta.
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What is musavada in the five precepts?
What is musāvādā in the five precepts?
On this five precepts page, it is translated as "incorrect speech", presumably by Ven. Thanissaro.
On this DN 27 page, Ven. Sujato translated it as &...
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Does the breath literally stop in the fourth Jhāna?
I've been trying to understand the descriptions of each of the Jhānas in various Suttas, and I don't get what's meant by an element in some descriptions of the fourth Jhāna. For example:
When one has ...
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Putting "Bhikkhu" before or after name, is there a difference?
For example there's Bhikkhu Bodhi and Thanissaro Bhikkhu. What's the distinction?
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Is samadhi the same as samatha? Is there khanika samatha?
I read the following on the internet:
Notice there's a wide spectrum on the Samatha/Vipassana scale, but
even on the extreme spectrum of Vipassana, the "dry-insight", there's
still element ...
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Why are pleasant feelings "stressful" & "unpleasant"?
I read the following in the internet:
All feelings are categorically classed as unpleasant in the
Dhamma...'Three feelings have been spoken of by the Blessed One: a
feeling of pleasure, a feeling of ...
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What is ariya or noble?
What is ariya or noble?
This term is used in multiple places like Four Noble Truths (cattāri ariyasaccāni), Noble Eightfold Path (ariya aṭṭhaṅgika magga), noble sangha (ariya saṅgha).
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nupassana or upassana?
A Wikipedia article about Sati uses the word "upassanā"
According to Grzegorz Polak, the four upassanā have been misunderstood by the developing Buddhist tradition, ...
https://en.wikipedia....
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The meaning/concept of maññassavā / Dhatu-vibhanga Sutta (MN 140)
travellers -
I was struck by the term maññassavā in the Dhatuvibhanga Sutta.
They have four foundations, standing on which the streams of
identification don’t flow. And when the streams of ...
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Conversational Pali and Sanskrit?
When people speaking different languages came from other lands to meditate, did that ever necessitate speaking the language in which they chanted?
Has there ever been a situation where circumstances ...
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What's the meaning of "Pāli" and its relevance in regard of the Buddha's Dhamma?
Do you know about the etymology of the Pāḷi word “Pāḷi”, how it breaks up and from what root it is formed etc.? And can you recall any more or less lengthy scholarly or otherwise discussions to which ...
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Good source of mantras with their meanings
Where can I find a reliable list of mantras with their respective translations?
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Difference between Kamma, Kammanto, and Kammanta?
Question
Hi all, i would like to ask if anyone knows the difference in meaning between these three pali words:
Kamma
Kammanto
Kammanta
What i've found so far
I can see from looking at the pali ...
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Can someone provide a transliteration of Sri Lankan script following the western Pali standard?
Sadly, Indo-Germanic languages aren't well transliterated following international standards (which are far from purposes, aside of productivity and cutting down to lowest).
The romanization of Pali ...
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Why are the words "mano" & "manasa" used in the opening Dhammapada verses?
The well-known yet often differently translated opening verses of the Dhamma use the Pali words "mano" and "manasa", as follows:
Manopubbaṅgamā dhammā,
manoseṭṭhā manomayā;
Manasā ce ...
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Union with Brahma, or company of Brahma?
The following phrase comes from DN 13:
“ayameva ujumaggo, ayamañjasāyano niyyāniko niyyāti takkarassa
brahmasahabyatāya, yvāyaṃ akkhāto brāhmaṇena pokkharasātinā”ti.
T.W. Rhys Davids translated ...
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Was is the difference between "uparujjhati" & "nirujjhati"?
In the Pali, nirujjhati (ni + rudh + ya) appears to be a verb for the noun "nirodha".
nirujjhati
ceases; dissolves; vanishes.
to be broken up, to be dissolved, to be destroyed, to cease, ...
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Best Pali to English translation source
I’m very new to Buddhism and am wanting to find an accurate source to show me the word-for-word interpretations of terms and words. Right now I’m trying to learn the meaning of each word of the “Ethan ...
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Is the Sinhalese language very different to Pali?
I notice many Sinhalese posting on Western chatsites about Buddhism. However, I often notice these Sinhalese don't have particularly strong empathy with the Pali of the suttas. I sometimes feel "...
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Recommendation for Suttas
I have been practising Vipassana for quite a while (2 and half years). Now, I want to also dwell into the teachings of Buddha as presented in Suttas and apply those teaching in my everday life. I have ...
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Difference between "perception" and "view"?
What is the difference between view (as in "right view" in the Noble Eightfold Path) and perception (as in the 3rd of the five Skandha's)?
Grateful for help! Peace, Tord
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Is there a defined counting system in Pali?
‘‘Sataṃ sahassānaṃ nirabbudānaṃ,
Chattiṃsatīṃ pañca ca abbudāni;
Yamariyagarahī nirayaṃ upeti,
Vācaṃ manañca paṇidhāya pāpakan’’ti.
~ Cited from: Paṭhamakhatasuttaṃ, Bhaṇḍagāmavagga, ...
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Why is the Pali word 'sattānaṃ' in Dependent Origination plural?
In this previous question, I listed the results of my investigations into how each nidana (link) in dependent origination appears to be 'singular', except 'sankhara', which is plural.
The 'jati' ('...
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How can we know the original meaning of a word with certainty?
In a lot of discussions here in B.S.E, the topic of the exact meaning of some terms keeps recurring, and nobody seems to have the last word.
Words such as 'upapajjati', 'paccājāyati', 'abhinibbatti' ...
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Why is the Pali word 'saṅkhārā' in Dependent Origination plural?
In researching Dependent Origination as described in SN 12.2 and using a basic Pali language guide (page 18), I found the following about each main Pali word:
jarāmaraṇaṃ singular from maraṇa ...
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What is the meaning of uppajjati versus upapajjati?
In the Pali there are two terms, which are (generally) used contextually in two different ways:
uppajjati (and its past particle uppanna)
upapajjati (and its past particle upapanna)
What do these ...
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Are the Pali words "cause" ("hetu'), "condition" ("paccaya"), "nutriment" ("ahara") and "root" ("mula") synonyms?
Are the Pali words "cause" ("hetu'), "condition" ("paccaya"), "nutriment" ("ahara") and "root" ("mula") always synonyms?
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Is Vinanna a Reification of Recognition?
I read on the Internet that Experience (Vijnana) which is really nothing but reification of Recognition (or Interpretation) of new observations in terms of internalized old observations.
Is this ...
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Are Samskara in Pratītyasamutpāda a cohesive collection of memories or imprints?
I read a view on the internet that Samskara in Pratītyasamutpāda a cohesive collection of memories or imprints.
Is this view or idea taught in the Pali Suttas? If so, please provide some quotes?
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What is the difference between moha (delusion) and avijja (ignorance)?
What is moha (delusion)? What is avijja or avidya (ignorance)?
What is the difference between moha (delusion) and avijja or avidya (ignorance)?
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What titles apply to non-monastic/lay Buddhists? (upasaka/upasika savaka/sravaka)
Labels are illusions like all conditioned phenomena, but I have an attachment to taxonomy and being able to describe myself accurately. I'm working on that, but in the meantime, I thought this would ...
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