A New Course in Reading Pali (Entering the Word of the Buddha)

This book had its beginnings in a set of graded readings and grammatical notes that the authors began to assemble and discuss a number of years ago, when we found that _there was a lack of introductory material for Pali that emphasized reading and a direct approach to texts that could be read by beginning students and at the same time conveyed some of the fundamental Buddhist ideas concepts that were embodied in the Pali tradition. Professor Karunatillake played the primary role in the original selection, which thus had a Sri Lankan Buddhist perspective. At the same time, we believed that a text of this nature should be graded in terms of grammar and as far as possible, vocabulary, since we were aiming at a beginning student, and did not want to presume any prior knowledge, as of Sanskrit. Thus we resolved throughout to treat Pali as a language in its own right. In short, we attempted to apply the same approach that we and others had used in texts for modern spoken and written languages. Along the way to the present work, there were numerous replacements, additions, and re- orderings, along with many valuable and pleasant hours of analysis and discussion if both grammar and content. These lessons have also been used in successive forms in our Pali classes, and the progress and the reactions of the students have been encouraging indeed. We hope that the original perspective and intent has been retained.

Too many colleagues and students have contributed comments and encouragement for us to name them, but we would particularly like to single out a few. Successive generations of students have pointed out misprints and missing items along with unclarities or difficulties that they encountered. In particular, Kim Atkins not only fulfilled those functions, but typed a great deal of the text in an earlier form. Richard Carlson and Tamara Hudec were particularly active in the editing function as they learned. Rama Wiietunga and L. Sumangala contributed suggestions, and colleagues and friends, such as john Ross Carter, Charles Hallisey, and john Paolillo encouraged us to bring this material to final form. Charles Hallisey also made a special contribution, by using this text in his classes at Harvard and making numerous suggestions that have found their way into this version. We also thank Professor Lakshmi Narayan Tiwari for his valuable suggestions, and Mr N.P. Jain of Motilal Banarsidass for his help in bringing this work to publication at last.

We will be happy for comments and suggestions, and hope that others will find these materials useful as we have. If it offers, even in a small way, entry for more students, whether in formal classes or not, into the language and thought of 1 Pali Buddhist texts, we will feel more than amply rewarded for what efforts we have put into the task.

What is in this Introduction: This introduction is in four parts: The first describes the principles on which this text is organized and suggests how it is intended to be most efficiently used. Students, especially those proceeding on their own outside of a regular class, are thus strongly urged to read that section before beginning their study. The second part deals with the alphabet and alphabetical order, with some information on the pronunciation (phonological system) system of Pali. Interested students may investigate the latter, but all should at least become acquainted with the order of the alphabet in order to use the glossaries in this text. The third part gives some general background to Pali language and literature, particularly those works on which we have drawn for find useful in studying Pali, and continuing past this text.

About the Book:

Pali, in addition to its importance as a Middle Indic language, is the classical language of Theravada Buddhist texts and it is thus the Buddhist canonical language of such Theravada countries as Thailand, Cambodia, Sri Lanka and Burma. As a gateway to that important body of textual material it is of special importance to the student or scholar of Buddhism as well as being of great interest from the literary-cultural as well as the linguistic and historical points of view.

The book is intended to serve as an introduction to the reading of Pali texts. For that purpose, it uses authentic readings especially compiled for the purpose drawn largely from Theravada canonical works, both prose and poetry. The readings are in Roman script, and carefully graded for difficulty, but they have also been selected so that each of them is a meaningful and complete reading in itself, so as to introduce some basic concepts and ways of thought of Theravada Buddhism. This book thus offers an opportunity to become acquainted with the ways in which the teachings of the Buddha are embodied in the language; a sense that is impossible to determine from English translations. The book contains 12 lessons. Each of them has three parts: (1) a set of basic readings and an accompanying glossary, (2) grammatical notes on the forms in the lesson, and (3) a set of further readings with its own glossary. The further readings introduce no new grammatical points, but reinforce ones already presented and give further practice in them. The work concludes, fittingly, with the Buddha's first sermon, The Dhammacakkapavattana Sutta. A cumulative glossary and index to the grammar is also provided.

The text has been used successfully in its preliminary form at several universities, but it may also be used for self-study.

About the Author:

JAMES W. GAIR is professor of Linguistics and South Asian Languages at Cornell University. W.S. KARUNATILLAKE is Professor of Linguistics at Kelaniya University, Sri Lanka. This Pali text is product of a long collaborative association during which they have also produced other works, primarily on the languages of Sri Lanka.

PART I: THIS TEXT AND HOW TO USE IT
PART II: PALI ALPHABET AND PRONUNCIATION
PART III: THE LANGUAGE AND TEXTS
PART IV: SOME USEFUL SOURCES

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