Re: An āmalakī in the palm of th e hand

Sun May 8 16:11:09 UTC 2011

The still-current Tamil proverb uḷḷaṅkai nellik kaṉi pōl, like the Sanskrit hastāmalaka,  is used to suggest something is clear and obvious.  In Akananuru 5 (1-3 cent CE?) the nelli fruit (kaṉi means "ripe fruit") is compared to crystal (paḷiṅku -- paḷiṅkattu aṉṉa pal kāy nelli).  Here is Jean-Luc's earlier contribution to the list:

> Greetings from Pondicherry,
> 
> the comparison is apparently also found in the Teevaaram,
> a collection of Tamil hymns to Siva,
> possibly dating back to the 7th and 8th centuries.
> 
> See:
> "http://www.ifpindia.org/ecrire/upload/digital_database/Site/Digital_Tevaram/U_TEV/VMS5_072.HTM#p2"
> <http://www.ifpindia.org/ecrire/upload/digital_database/Site/Digital_Tevaram/U_TEV/VMS5_072.HTM#p2>
> 
> The text reads:
> "kaiyil aamalakak kan_i okkumee"
> (teevaaram, 5-72, 2)
> 
> The normal Tamil name of that fruit is "nelli"
> 
> -- Jean-Luc Chevillard (EFEO/CNRS)

It seems to me this makes it clear that the Sanskrit texts refer to the fruit, not rock crystal.  George Hart

On May 7, 2011, at 1:49 PM, Birgit Kellner wrote:

> Reading once more through this interesting thread, I was just wondering: Schmidt's Nachträge to the Petersburg Dictionary reports āmalaka in the meaning "rock crystal". Two passages in Somadevasūri's Yaśastilaka (Kāvyamālā vol. 70) are given as evidence (vol. II 28,4 and 209,6; this is available at http://www.dli.ernet.in/). Not too much evidence, but there might be more, and it might have been overlooked so far, who knows.
> 
> In an earlier message, for instance, Lance Cousins cited a passage from the older ṭīkā to the Abhidhammāvatāra (final pāda of Abhidh-av v. 181), where the āmalaka is compared to a clear gem. The basic text has "hatthagatāmalakā viya honti"; the ṭīkā then runs: *hatthagatā* hatthapaviṭṭhā *āmalakā viya* suddhamaṇikā viya honti.
> 
> One could theoretically interpret this passage in two ways:
> 
> - the āmalaka-fruit is seen, and the clarity of seeing the āmalaka is further illustrated by the example of a clear gem.
> - the word āmalaka here means "rock-crystal", and suddhamaṇikā is then just an explanatory gloss on it.
> 
> So one might ask whether there's any further unequivocal evidence that āmalaka was used in the meaning "rock-crystal" in Pāli or Sanskrit. And if that were the case, Tibetan interpretations appealing to translucency would appear less outrageous than they initially might have seeemed.
> 
> One context where the āmalaka-in-your-palm-example features is the discussion of yogic perception in Buddhist epistemological literature. See Dharmottara's Nyāyabinduṭīkā ad Nyāyabindu 1.11 (cited according to p. 69,1f. from Dalsukhbhai Malvania's edition of the Dharmottarapradīpa): karatalāmalakavad bhāvyamānasya arthasya yad darśanaṃ tad yoginaḥ pratyakṣam | tad dhi sphuṭābham | Roughly: "Yogic perception is the seeing of an object that is contemplated upon like an āmalaka in one's hand, for it has a clear appearance."
> 
> The canonical Tibetan translation, Derge 4231 (We 44a3), here translates āmalaka as śel sgoṅ (also attested as a translation of sphāṭika accordng to Negi's dictionary). So these translators definitely understood āmalaka in the meaning "rock crystal".
> 
> On the face of it, the rock crystal makes in this particlar context better sense than the myrobalan fruit. The idea is that the yogin contemplates an object, which in the process becomes clear and vivid to him, as clear and vivid as a piece of rock-crystal in one's hand. More precisely: the rock-crystal as a thing exemplifies clarity and vividness more directly than the myrobalan fruit.
> 
> And now, I suppose, one would have to look closer at the finer structure of āmalaka-similes. Is something said to be as self-evident as the SEEING of the āmalaka in one's hand? What is the role of the āmalaka being placed in one's hand? (I suppose: the object is close to the observer, and so this proximity would further accentuate the self-evidence.) Does the comparison attach to features of the āmalaka as such? Are there any features of the āmalaka that make it clearer in your hand than other fruits? (Colour?) Any commentarial explanations of this?
> 
> Maybe the example underwent some changes (in Sanskritic traditions or between Sanskrit and Tibetan, who knows). Epistemological discussions of yogic perception, for instance, might in the eyes of some interpreters have called for a sharper analogy that highlights the clarity of an object-appearance - and makes the object itself clear and vivid and (coincidentally?) translucent.
> 
> Best regards,
> 
> Birgit Kellner
> 
> 
> 
> 
> ________________________________________
> Von: Indology [INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk] im Auftrag von Peter Szanto [peter.szanto at MERTON.OX.AC.UK]
> Gesendet: Samstag, 30. April 2011 21:39
> An: INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk
> Betreff: Re: [INDOLOGY] an āmalakī in the palm of th e hand
> 
> Dear readers,
> 
> While I do not want to commit myself to any of the siddhāntas expressed here, I believe these two passages (sadly, surviving only in Tibetan) merit consideration:
> 
> Tōh. 1373 *Ṣaḍaṅgayogapañjikā of Avadhūtīpāda (244r)
> 
> de ltar mthong ba'i rnal 'byor ba de ni rnam pa thams cad mkhyen pa'i sku des ni khams gsum ma lus pa skyu ru ra lag mthil du bzhag pa bzhin du thams cad sa ler mkhyen pa'o || chu nang nyi ltar rab snang ba || dri ma med pa'i sna tshogs mdog | rnam pa kun du rang gi sems || gzhan gyi sems min rang gi sems || rang gi sems yin bde ba nyid || gzhan gyi sems min bde ba yin || yul dang rnam par bral ba yin || rang bde yid kyi nyams myong ba || gzhan gyi sems bde chen po'i phyir || bde ba bstan du mi btub bo || zhes 'byung ngo ||
> 
> Tōh. 1415 Vajraḍākavivṛti of Bhavabhaṭṭa (82v)
> 
> rdo rje mig gis mthong bar 'gyur || zhes bya ba la rdo rje ni shin tu rno ba ste | gsal zhing dri ma med pa des mthong ba'o || ji ltar zhe na | lag tu shing tog bzhag pa bzhin te lag pa'i mthil na gnas pa'i skyu ru ra'i 'bras bu ltar ro ||
> 
> The `Tibetan idea' of transparency could have been induced by passages such as the first one (note that `sa ler' is ambivalent, it can mean both `entirely' and `clearly'). Well, by using the word induced I guess I do find myself more in agreement with what Dominik Wujastyk wrote below.
> 
> With best regards,
> 
> Peter
> 
> ________________________________________
> From: Indology [INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk] On Behalf Of Dominik Wujastyk [wujastyk at GMAIL.COM]
> Sent: Saturday, April 30, 2011 8:21 PM
> To: INDOLOGY at liverpool.ac.uk
> Subject: Re: [INDOLOGY] an āmalakī in the palm of the hand
> 
> Dear Ryan,
> 
> In my view, your Tibetan colleagues are simply wrong.  Or else they are in receipt some odd tradition that has strayed far from the original meaning of the āmalaka-in-the-hand simile, and got lost on the way.
> 
> The āmalaka/ī is and was the Emblic myrobalan (Emblica officinalis, Gaertn.<http://botanicus.org/name/Emblica_officinalis>).   There are many pictures on the web, and even one of some emblics in someone's hands: here<http://www.holistic-herbalist.com/image-files/amalaki5.jpg>.
> 
> Emblics are a common fruit in South Asia, and have been so for over two millennia.  The word "emblic" was very common in English amongst the British in India, as it was a well-known, fruit often consumed daily. Many references in Hobson-Jobson<http://dsal.uchicago.edu/cgi-bin/philologic/getobject.pl?p.1:242.hobson> (who also asserts on good authorities that Skt. āmalaka is the origin of the name of the Malay city Malacca!).  My subjective impression is that British Indian authors referred to emblics more or less as one might today refer to an apple.  "Emblic" wasn't at all a rare word (or fruit).
> 
> The simile is just, as you say, something totally obvious.  Think, "as plain as an apple in the palm of your hand."
> 
> I think we can just set aside all talk of transparency and inner structure.  (I also think that the idea that something with an exterior can in some sense be explained by reference to its inner structure is probably a rather modern idea, and probably not Sanskritic at all.  At the very least, it should be questioned, as a concept.  Ask, with what vocabularly would such a concept be expressed in Sanskrit?)
> 
> Best,
> 
> Dominik
> 
> 
> On 29 April 2011 07:47, Ryan Damron <rdamron at berkeley.edu<mailto:rdamron at berkeley.edu>> wrote:
> Dear all,
> 
> I recently came across a reference to the āmalaki fruit in the Buddhist Mahāmāyātantra and in its commentary, the Guṇavatī by Ratnākaraśānti. The citations are as follows:
> 
> First from the root tantra, in Tibetan (there is no extant Sanskrit manuscript):  lag tu skyu ru ra bzhag bzhin.
> 
> Which Ratnākaraśānti glosses with: svahaste sthitamekamāmalakam yathetyarthaḥ
> 
> I initially took this to mean simply that the referent was as clear to the subject as a fruit placed in one's own hand.  However, two Tibetan colleagues both asserted that the āmalakī fruit, as understood in the Tibetan Buddhist tradition at least, is a translucent fruit which reveals its inner structure to the subject (not my personal experience with the contemporary version of Amalaki fruit).  Thus for a situation to be "like an āmalakī fruit in one's own hand" means one is able to see the referent inside and out, that is, in totality.  My question then is this:  is this analogy common in Indic traditions and, more importantly, are there any known references to these properties of the āmalakī in Sanskrit works?
> 
> Much thanks,
> 
> Ryan
> 
> Ryan Damron
> Graduate Student
> Department of South and Southeast Asian Studies
> University of California, Berkeley
> 
> 
> 
> Am 01.05.2011 03:17, schrieb c.cicuzza at iol.it:
>> Dear All,
>> 
>> one more example from the Pali literature transmitted in Siam:
>> 
>> so pana mahāmoggallānathero yathā puriso āmalakaphalaṃ gahetvā attano pāṇitale ṭhapeti.
>> 
>> Cf. Buddhapādamaṅgala (ed. in Cicuzza, C., A Mirror Reflecting the Entire World, Bangkok and Lumbini 2011, p. 58).
>> 
>> Best Regards,
>> 
>> Claudio Cicuzza
>> 
>> (Webster University)
> 
> 
> -- 
> --------
> 
> Prof. Dr. Birgit Kellner
> Chair in Buddhist Studies
> Cluster of Excellence "Asia and Europe in a Global Context - Shifting Asymmetries in Cultural Flows"
> University of Heidelberg
> Karl Jaspers Centre
> Vossstraße 2, Building 4400
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