[Friday, August 15th]
Apologies for the delayed posting,
which was due to lack of internet connection.
⏑⏑−⏑¦⏑−−−¦¦−−⏑⏑¦⏑−⏑−
iti
vākyam arāḍasya vijñāya sa nararṣabhaḥ |
⏑−⏑⏑¦⏑−−−¦¦−−−⏑¦⏑−⏑−
babhūva
parama-prītaḥ provācottaram eva ca || 12.11
12.11
As Arāḍa said these words,
That bull among men,
investigating his words,
Was highly delighted
And in response, emphatically, up he
spoke:
COMMENT:
Today's verse looks as straightforward
as could be.
Hence,
EBC: The prince, having heard these
words of Arāḍa, was filled with great pleasure and thus made
reply.
EHJ: The bull of men, on hearing
this speech of Arada, was highly gratified and said to him in reply.
PO: Hearing these words of Arada,
that bull among men was filled with great joy and made this reply.
There are a couple of points, however,
that are lost in these translations.
The first point, as mentioned
yesterday, is that today's verse is the third in a row with a verb
from vi-√jñā,
to investigate. Rather than follow the principle of elegant
variation, Aśvaghoṣa persisted with the same verb three times. Was
it heedless inelegance on Aśvaghoṣa's part? No, you can bet your
bottom dollar it wasn't. So what was he up to?
Here
again I think a philosophical progression was in progress, one of the
virtues of such a progression being that it makes the verses easier
to memorize in sequence. Thus BC12.9 is remembered by vi-√jñā (1)
used in statement of a thesis (student investigates dharma); BC12.10
is remembered by vi-√jñā (2) used in an antithesis (teacher
investigates student); and today's verse, BC12.11 is remembered by
vi-√jñā (3) expressing an act of investigating which has been
going on right in the moment of the present, even as Arāḍa spoke.
The second point is that
uttaram has a double-meaning. Ostensibly it simply means an answer or
reply. But the words of Indian Zen ancestors which contain the prefix
-ut, like the words of Chinese Zen ancestors which contain the
character 上, often have a
sub-text which is to point in the direction of 仏向上事
(Jap: BUTSU-KOJO-JI), the matter of buddha going on up.
One
notable example of such a word in Sanskrit is pratītya-samutpāda;
hence my preferred translation of Springing Up,
by going back – in preference to the conventional
“Dependent/Conditional Origination.”
In
today's verse the word is uttaram, whose etymology is ut (up) + tara
(comparative suffix), so that as an adjective uttara means “more
up” or “superior”; and as a neuter noun uttara is given first
in the dictionary as “the upper surface.” Uttara also means
“north” – as in Uttar Pradesh, Indian's “Northern Province”
bordering on Nepal.
You
may think I am guilty of reading too much into a verse that was never
intended to have any such deeper hidden meaning. In my defence, I
have two rhetorical questions to ask:
1.
Where are other examples of verses written by Aśvaghoṣa that do
not, upon further investigation, have deeper layers of hidden
meaning?
2.
How else do you understand the use, after uttaram, of the emphatic
eva?
In
the background, or below the surface, I think Aśvaghoṣa was
conscious of, and was suggesting, the fact that Arāḍa's teaching
was going in the right direction. And the right direction is,
primarily, up. But the bodhisattva-prince, as a veritable bull among
men, was destined to go even further in the right direction. And that
meant going even
more up
– uttaram eva ca!
VOCABULARY
iti:
“....,” thus
vākyam
(acc. sg.): n. speech, saying, words
arāḍasya
(gen. sg.): of Arāḍa
vijñāya
= abs. vi- √ jñā: to distinguish , discern , observe ,
investigate , recognize , ascertain , know , understand
sa
(nom. sg. m.): he
nararṣabhaḥ
(nom. sg.): m. a bull among men; prince
ṛṣabha:
m. bull; the best or most excellent of any kind or race
babhūva
= 3rd pers. sg. perf. bhū: to be, become, have,
experience
parama-prītaḥ
(nom. sg. m.): delight of the highest order
prīta:
mfn. pleased , delighted , satisfied , joyful , glad ; n. pleasure,
delight
provāca
= 3rd pers. sg. perf. pra- √ vac : to proclaim ; to
speak, say, tell
uttaram
(acc. sg.): n. the upper surface; n. answer , reply ; mfn. (compar.
fr. ud ; opposed to adhara) , upper , higher , superior
eva:
(emphatic)
ca: and
太子聞其教 歡喜而報言
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