Buddhist Hybrid Sanskrit Original Language

Author(s): Johannes Bronkhorst
Publisher: Johannes Bronkhorst

Page 11

Buddhist Hybrid Sanskrit: The Original Language
415
evam caraṇtāna na duḥkha samyati"//
In this bhasya he has given his exposition in this way. Whatever is in existence, is the state that does not exist at all. For those who imagine existence and inexistence and practice accordingly suffering will not go to extinction. Afterwards he has discussed these things. Let other scholars come forward and I will only give the conclusion that we can have better discussion on the topic. Preceeding considerations have made it clear that different religions of the classical India which we have considered or share the belief that their sacred texts composed in the earliest language is the source of all other languages. In the case of the Theravada Buddhism and Jainism, position is fairly straight forward. The sacred language Pāli. Magadhi and Ardhamagadhi have respectively the source of other languages including Sanskrit. Position of the Vedic Brahmins was likely more complicated for differences between the Vedic and classical Sanskrit are considerable. But neither of these two was claimed to be the source of the other rather the Vedic and classical Sanskrit were maintained to constitute together one single language on which, ofcourse, was the language of the god's internal language. It appears that atleast some of those Buddhists who preserved the sacred texts in a Hybrid Sanskrit, took essentially the same position as the Brahmins. Please note this sentence. It appears that atleast some of those Buddhists who preserved sacred texts in Hybrid Sanskrit took essentially the same position as the Brahmins. They looked upon the language of he sacred texts as fundamentally identical with the classical Sanskrit. And they even used the Vedic rules of Panini to account for some special features of Hybrid Sanskrit. Bhartṛhari in the Vakyapadiya suggests some of those Buddhists to entertain the claim that their sacred language was the source of Sanskrit. This is the point.
Alex Wayman
Well, the thing is for Bronkhorst. I met him. I know more about him. But you know if you want to compare the way he does. the trouble is, you have to put these different systems in a more comprehensive way than he preferred, because the individual systems would go the wrong way without him if you try to talk
Samadhirāja sūtra 9.26 quoted in the Prasannapada on MMK 25.3.
416
Aspects of Buddhist Sanskrit
about every thing in one paper, Jainism, Veda, Buddhist texts. You have to admit it is a good write up. While speaking of all these things when he says for example in his conclusion, "it seems, then, atleast possible to mainain that... the origin of Sanskrit". In other words there were one or two who wrote in Sanskrit because there was some value in it. That is very true but what does it mean? What is the use of saying so? In other words, I fear that the two statements in his article are some sort of things that every body agrees on anyway, and there is the other speculative which is going its own way. That is what I want to say to Bronkhorst.
B. Oguibenine
I would like to say that this paper is interesting in so far as it seems to point out that since Buddhists use Sanskrit preserved in their texts in Buddhist Sanskrit. It seems to imply that they composed their text directly in the variety of Sanskrit. This may be confirmed. This is the major point which I collected from Bronkhorst's paper. Now the other question. One point seems to be most important and I don't know exactly the answer. Since he says rightly that some Buddhist Hybrid or Buddhist Sanskrit usages are explained by Sanskrit scholars like Candrakirti by reference to Panini, they always consider that their language is to be analysed according to Panini. At the same time they looked upon their. Sanskrit as superior as the Vedic. It is little bit contradictory so far as Vedic Sanskrit does not concern with Panini's rules. And the next important point is, I think. the grammarians at that time had a certain prestige, and it was not quite natural to refer to Panini, because it evinced prestige. This does not prove much that the desire to refer to Panini is exactly reflecting the nature of language.
K. Bhattacarya
First I have to congratulate Bronkhorst, in his absence, of course, for bringing together all these valuable materials, some of which are well known and others not well known. I am to say much about the title. The title seems to me to be a little misleading. So, when I started reading the paper yesterday. I thought that I was going to get something very sensational, that is, he was going to reveal to us that the Buddhist Hybrid Sanskrit is the original language. But the matter is entirely different. This is a minor question. I think that he can modify the title a little bit. I come to the