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- Path: sparky!uunet!math.fu-berlin.de!ira.uka.de!scsing.switch.ch!news.univie.ac.at!paladin.american.edu!auvm!SICS.SE!TORKEL
- Message-ID: <9301261853.AA03202@anhur.sics.se>
- Newsgroups: bit.listserv.words-l
- Date: Tue, 26 Jan 1993 19:53:37 +0100
- Sender: English Language Discussion Group <WORDS-L@uga.cc.uga.edu>
- From: torkel@SICS.SE
- Subject: Re: Asians
- Comments: To: English Language Discussion Group <WORDS-L@uga.cc.uga.edu>
- In-Reply-To: Your message of Tue,
- 26 Jan 93 11:57:00 -0600. <9301261841.AA17115@sics.se>
- Lines: 18
-
- >Now I realize that there was a confusion. By "sutra" I didn't mean just
- >any scriptural writing, but a "sutra". Although of course, if you ask me
- >what a sutra is, I have no answer to give except "something which is called
- >a sutra".
-
- Conze:
-
- "Another important division is that between Sutra and Shastra. A sutra
- is a text which claims to have been spoken by the Buddha himself. It always
- begins with the words, Thus have I heard at one Time. The Lord dwelt at...
- The 'I' here means the disciple Ananda, who recited the entire Buddha-word
- immediately after the Buddha's death. Many sutras were composed centuries
- after the death of the Buddha. The actual authors of the sutras which were
- not spoken by the historical Buddha himself are, of course, unknown."
-
- Elsewhere, Conze states that we have no way of knowing which sutras
- (whether preserved in Pali or in Sanskrit) were spoken by the
- historical Buddha himself.
-