compounds of opposites?

[Ashok Aklujkar]

v.rddha-yuvatii (with a short "i" at the end in the P.L. Vaidya edn
accessible to me) is probably not a compound of opposites but a cd. on the
pattern of V.rddha-manu (the indices to P.V. Kane's History of
Dharma-;saastra list several such V.rddha- texts/authors),
V.rddha-vasu-bandhu etc.

I am not aware of any focused study of this use of v.rddha. However, from
what I have read here and there, I think a meaning like 'more extensive,
larger' cannot be ruled out, just as there may be some support for a meaning
like 'senior, older.' Possibly, both the meanings were intended if one goes
along with Yudhi.s.thira Miimaa.msaka's view, expressed in his Hindi work
_Sa.msk.rta Vyaakara.na ;saastra kaa itihaasa_ that the earlier forms of
important Indian texts were generally larger than their forms surviving
later or accessible to us.

Thus, the basic meaning of v.rddha-yuvati could have been 'an older/stronger
young woman, an experienced female who had not lost her youthful strength.'
Such a meaning is not incompatible with the context which minimally requires
that the woman spoken of as v.rddha-yuvati be capable of helping in another
woman's delivery of a child.

ashok aklujkar

On 2003-09-03 22:09, "Jonathan Silk" <silk at HUMNET.UCLA.EDU> wrote:

> Twice in the Divyaavadaana (Cowell and Neil 1886: 254.22, 483.25)
> occurs the word v.rddha-yuvatii, glossed by the editors, apparently
> only contextually, once as midwife, again as procuress. When we have
> a parallel in the Vinayavibhanga of the Muulasarvaastivaada Vinaya in
> Tibetan (bud med rgan mo) and Chinese (lao3-mu3) only, both interpret
> simply in the sense of old woman.