[INDOLOGY] Query on negation

Tue May 21 13:12:00 UTC 2013

Yes, indeed, the Pune dictionary cites adharmajña (Manu 8.59), but only as one who does not know dharma. The only example of "one who knows adharma" is, obviously, in the compound dharmādharmajña. But the dictionary does make the useful distinction in the Roman transliteration:

a-dharmajña and adharma-jña.
a-dharmacaryā and adharma-caraṇa, etc.

Patrick

On May 21, 2013, at 2:57 AM, Malhar Arvind Kulkarni wrote:

> I would like to point out that the EDSHP, Deccan College, Pune has a
> policy of a. recording compounds and b. showing such meaning differences
> in such compounds with a cut, an ic (immediate constituent) cut. I believe
> they have covered 'adha...'. I do not have the Dictionary with me as I am
> travelling but surely the word and the reference, Patrick quotes, may be
> referred to there.
> 
> Malhar Kulkarni.
> 
> 
>> Thanks to Birgit for referencing my article. The upshot of the article is
>> to argue that the distinction the two forms of negation identified by the
>> grammatical tradition corresponds to what contemporary linguists would
>> characterize as wide and narrow scope negation. The parsing of the
>> compound as (a-dharma)-j~na gives the privative prefix narrow scope, while
>> the parsing as a-(dharma-j~na) gives the privative prefix wide scope.
>> 
>> This ambiguity is exhibited by such English compounds as `un-button-ed'.
>> An `unbuttoned shirt' may be either a shirt which one has never buttoned
>> or shirt which had been buttoned but someone has undone the buttoning.
>> 
>> Such ambiguities are typically decided by context, as Madhav pointed out.
>> 
>> Best wishes,
>> 
>> Brendan Gillon
>> 
>> Brendan S. Gillon                            email:
>> brendan.gillon at mcgill.ca
>> Department of Linguistics
>> McGill University                             tel.:  001 514 398 4868
>> 1085, Avenue Docteur-Penfield
>> Montreal, Quebec                           fax.:  001 514 398 7088
>> H3A 1A7  CANADA
>> 
>> webpage: http://webpages.mcgill.ca/staff/group3/bgillo/web/
>> ________________________________
>> From: INDOLOGY [indology-bounces at list.indology.info] on behalf of Madhav
>> Deshpande [mmdesh at umich.edu]
>> Sent: Monday, May 20, 2013 5:02 PM
>> To: Patrick Olivelle
>> Cc: Indology
>> Subject: Re: [INDOLOGY] Query on negation
>> 
>> If we are dealing with accented Sanskrit, then adharma+jña would give us
>> the udātta accent on the final syllable, while a+dharmajña would give us
>> the initial udātta.  But in Sanskrit without accents, we have to rely on
>> the context to make this distinction.  A good case may be adharmacārin
>> that I have seen in a few places, where it indeed means those who behave
>> in unrighteous ways.
>> 
>> Madhav
>> 
>> 
>> On Mon, May 20, 2013 at 3:46 PM, Patrick Olivelle
>> <jpo at uts.cc.utexas.edu<mailto:jpo at uts.cc.utexas.edu>> wrote:
>> Thank you very much, Birgit. This is very illuminating. I will check out
>> this study.
>> 
>> Patrick
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> On May 20, 2013, at 2:25 PM, Birgit Kellner wrote:
>> 
>>> Brendan Gillon once argued that the distinction between the two types of
>>> negation called prasajyapratiṣedha and paryudāsa is precisely the one
>>> that accounts for the different interpretations in Patrick Olivelle's
>>> example: a syntactic difference in terms of whether the negation has
>>> wide scope (prasajyap.) - "not knowing the dharma" - or narrow scope
>>> (paryudāsa) - "knowing something that is not dharma". But I can't think
>>> of indicators other than context that would allow to determine which
>>> interpretation is to be preferred.
>>> 
>>> @ARTICLE{Gillon_Brendan_1987,
>>> author = {Gillon, Brendan S.},
>>> title = {Two Forms of Negation in Sanskrit: prasajyapratiṣedha and
>>> paryudāsapratiṣedha},
>>> journal = {Lokaprajñā },
>>> year = {1987},
>>> volume = {1/1},
>>> pages = {81-89},
>>> }
>>> 
>>> With best regards,
>>> 
>>> Birgit Kellner
>>> 
>>> Am 20.05.2013 21:09, schrieb Patrick Olivelle:
>>>> bhoḥ paṇḍitāḥ!!
>>>> 
>>>> I have a question regarding a negative prefix "a" when used in a
>>>> compound.
>>>> 
>>>> For example, at Manu 8.59 we have the compound "adharmajñau", which in
>>>> my translation I have rendered as "two men ignorant of the Law" taking
>>>> the negative prefix to apply to the whole compound "dharmajñau".
>>>> Medhātithi commenting on this verse (and the Smṛticandrikā [Mysore ed.
>>>> III: 287] cites Medh approvingly) appears to think that these two men
>>>> were proficient in adharma, that is, in subterfuge (chala). Then the
>>>> compound would consist of adharma and jña -- adharma being here ways of
>>>> subverting justice. In the Smṛticandrikā the example given is a man
>>>> who, knowing that other kinds of evidence is valid only for a year (I
>>>> am not sure how he gets this??), gets a document written with 10
>>>> thousand paṇas, when it should have been just 5 thousand. This is the
>>>> chala or adharma (ways of getting around legal procedures) in which the
>>>> man if proficient.
>>>> 
>>>> This sort of ambiguity must occur also in other similar compounds. Is
>>>> there a way to detect that? Or is it just a matter of context and
>>>> interpretation. Have the grammarians talked about this?
>>>> 
>>>> Thanks.
>>>> 
>>>> 
>>>> Patrick
>>>> _______________________________________________
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>>>> http://listinfo.indology.info
>>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> --
>>> --------
>>> Prof. Dr. Birgit Kellner
>>> Chair in Buddhist Studies
>>> Principal Investigator
>>> Deputy Speaker Research Area D "Historicities and Heritage"
>>> Cluster of Excellence "Asia and Europe in a Global Context - - the
>>> Dynamics of Transculturality"
>>> University of Heidelberg
>>> Karl Jaspers Centre
>>> Vossstraße 2, Building 4400
>>> D-69115 Heidelberg
>>> P: +49(0)6221 - 54 4301<tel:%2B49%280%296221%20-%2054%204301>
>>> F: +49(0)6221 - 54 4012<tel:%2B49%280%296221%20-%2054%204012>
>>> http://www.asia-europe.uni-heidelberg.de/en/research/cluster-professorships/buddhist-studies.html
>>> 
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>> 
>> 
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>> 
>> 
>> --
>> Madhav M. Deshpande
>> Professor of Sanskrit and Linguistics
>> Department of Asian Languages and Cultures
>> 202 South Thayer Street, Suite 6111
>> The University of Michigan
>> Ann Arbor, MI 48104-1608, USA
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> 
> 
> 