[INDOLOGY] sad news: Werner Knobl

Wed Oct 4 14:43:59 UTC 2023

I am very, very sad also to learn of the too early demise of my good 
friend and mentor Werner.
He was a luminous personnality and such an excellent teacher, always 
helpful and so gentle with everyone.
His knowledge of the R̥gveda was the most excellent I have seen. He was 
so intimate with that text that we had nicknamed him "The Kyoto R̥ṣi"!
But his virtuosity in Sanskrit was such that he could penetrate any 
piece of this vast literature with the same nearly supernatural insight.
I vividly remember sitting with him at his desk in his little office in 
Kyodai crammed with books from floor to ceiling for hours discussing the 
subtleties of the Śatapatha Brāhmaṇa or the Maitrāyaṇī Saṃhitā or some 
unfathomable piece of /kāvya. /His incredible linguistic intuition could 
make the most obscure passages clear as water in a snap. Then we would 
celebrate our little victories over the text with a good beer at the 
Nichi-Futsu Kaikan and continue our discussions on nearly every topic 
with his wonderful sense of humour late into the night, and with many 
more beers, and perhaps a little wine too.
There he gave me one of the best advices I received in all my life: 
"François! If you would just stop indulging in your computer programming 
for some time, you would know your Sanskrit better!"
Thus I did, and thus I became slightly better.
Werner was one of the last humanists I know.
I will deeply miss him.
Fare well my friend! I hope to see you again in the afterlife.
My thoughts go also to his wife and kids, and his beloved companion Carole.

With great sadness,

F. Voegeli

On 04.10.23 15:49, Jonathan Silk via INDOLOGY wrote:
> I just want here to add one thing: Werner was an incredibly gentle
> person, both in the way he spoke and the way he acted, but also at the
> same time with more than a bit of a sense of humor. I met him first in
> Kyoto around 1990, where I attended his Sanskrit course, as well as
> German (! We read in Windische's Geschichte der Sanskrit-Philologie).
> Among all the many memories (including--proving that this is the
> Kāliyuga, in which everything is inverted and backwards-- being one of
> the examiners for his PhD!!) , I very fondly remember when, some few
> years ago, I was in Paris, and had just visited the church at
> Montmarte with my son. It was a really hot day and we were looking for
> a cool drink. Walking down the street someone from behind me in French
> spoke as if begging for a coin, then tugging at my back. When I turned
> around, there was Werner with a gigantic smile on his face! It was so
> utterly charming to see him again in that way.  I shall sincerely miss
> him.
>
> Jonathan
>
> On Wed, Oct 4, 2023 at 3:24 PM Asko Parpola via INDOLOGY
> <indology at list.indology.info>  wrote:
>> I am very sorry to hear about the passing of Werner Knobl. He was less than a year my junior, and we became friends during my one-year stay in Kyoto in 1999. I met him also later, at the World Sanskrit conference in Helsinki in 2003, and during my stay in Kyoto in 2006. Werner remembered having seen me in Tübingen around 1970, when Dieter Dütting of the Max Planck Institute invited me to give a lecture on the Indus script — I remembered only meeting Werner’s teacher Paul Thieme. Werner told me that he revered Thieme so much that he was unable to publish anything as long as Thieme was alive, for the fear bthat it would not meet Thieme’s standard. I give below details of his life not found in Natiliya’s obituary. His surname Knobl comes from the German word Knobel.
>>
>> Knobl, Werner Franz (born in Eger, Bohemia [now Cheb in Czech Republic] 12 Sept 1942 - died 28 Sept 2023). Johannes-Gutenberg-Gymnasium, Wiesbaden, 1953-1962. Studied Philosophy, Theology, Indology, Arabistik and Linguistics at Frankfurt (1962-1964), Paris (1964-1965), Mainz (1965-1966) and Tübingen (1966-1980). Wrote an Indological Dissertation in 1980 (Promotor: Paul Thieme) which remained undefended. Went to Japan in Sept 1980. Taught Vedic and Classical Sanskrit as full-time "Foreign Lecturer" at Kanazawa (1981-1991) and Kyoto (1991-2006); as part-time teacher at Fukui (1980-1984), Hiroshima (1989-2001), Otani (2006-2009) and Kyoto (2006-2009). Vedic classes at the Leiden Summer School (from 2008 to 2023). Held an intensive course in "Vedic grammar and syntax" inclusive of reading Vedic hymns and prose (in German) at the University of Halle, Germany, on 14-25 Sept 2009. Ph. D., Leiden University, 30 Sept 2009 (Promotor: Alexander Lubotsky). Married to Chizuko Suzuki, three children (and, in 2010, one grandson). Home address: 9-4 Shibuse-cho, Kitashirakawa, Sakyo-ku, Kyoto-606-8283 Japan.
>>
>>
>> Missing Werner, Asko Parpola
>>
>>
>>
>> On 4. Oct 2023, at 10.53, Nataliya Yanchevskaya via INDOLOGY<indology at list.indology.info>  wrote:
>>
>> Dear Collegues,
>> I am so sorry to pass along the sad news: Werner Knobl, a scholar of Vedic language, texts, and culture, passed away on September 28, 2023.
>> He will be greatly missed by many.
>> Below I am forwarding Werner's orbituary written by Natālija Burišina who is not a member of the list.
>> NY
>>
>> ---------------------------
>>
>> Dear All,
>>
>>   On behalf of Dr. Werner Knobl’s students, I have very sad news to announce… Our Beloved Teacher, Werner, the Master of Vedic lore whose ocean of knowledge was enormous and absolutely unique in its own way, passed away last Thursday, on 28th September. There are no words to express how much I am already missing our Great Teacher, our classes, discussions, and our Little Vedic Sanskrit Lovers community.
>>
>> Let me briefly sketch our first encounter and further collaboration. Alongside with other Vedic Sanskrit learners, I joined the Leiden Summer School in Languages and Linguistics in 2022, where we spent two beautiful and saturated weeks studying fragments from the Ṛgveda and Brāhmaṇas. Thus, when the Summer School was nearing to the end some of us expressed a wish to continue our studies online. After that Werner discussed it with the Director, Sasha Lubotsky to receive his approval, which was then generously granted.
>>
>> And so, until the next Summer School in Leiden we were lucky to meet online 10 times during the autumn-winter of 2022, and the same in the spring of 2023. Our group was formed of former and current Werner’s students, who joined the classes from different corners of the world. Werner always welcomed questions either sent to him by email, or asked during the class. He was happy to give elaborate answers to any difficult questions, and did not hesitate to discuss and oppose the opinions of other scholars, and even His teacher, the late Paul Thieme, whom he frequently recalled with great veneration, however, He always did so with great respect. Moreover, He continuously encouraged us to have our own analyses and never missed to add the phrase: “You are not obliged to trust me,” or else “If you want to accept this argument […]”. I dare to say that most of us were impatiently looking forward to our weekly online sessions that allowed us not only to get immersed in the realm of Vedic mythopoetics that dates back for more than 3000 years, but also to look at the aspects of Historical Linguistics, intricate Grammar matters, Vedic intonation, philology, translation problems of some difficult passages, etc.
>>
>> I was lucky to meet Our Great Teacher, Werner, again in Leiden during the closing party of the Summer School.
>>
>> This was my second and last encounter in life with our Beloved Teacher and his companion Carole with whom we had a wonderful conversation about our passion for Vedic Sanskrit, about how she met Werner in Japan and many more…
>>
>> I am immensely grateful to Our Beloved Teacher for all the knowledge He shared with us, for allowing us to discern all the subtleties of the Vedic poetry through His lens; for His kindness and all the support that every aspiring student and scholar needs so much at the initial stages. I still keep on receiving messages expressing gratitude for His kindness from scholars and students whom He had supported with both critique and advice…
>>
>> For all of this, I am ineffably grateful to You, our Beloved Teacher, and as such You will always remain in my memories. I am somehow certain that our souls will meet again, somewhere in svargaloka…
>>
>> R.I.P.
>>
>>
>> <image.png>
>>
>>
>> Ar cieņu
>> Met vriendelijke groet,
>> Best regards,
>>
>> Natālija Burišina
>>
>>
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