Don’t be intimidated. A few students are rocking some advanced stuff, but most of them are with you!
Sure!
Evaṁ is an indeclinable particle, which means that it (almost always) appears in the same way in any context, without being inflected. (I say “almost” because the final letter can change when it is is combined with a following word (eg. evam’eva “in just this way”, or evan’ti “It is so!”, but this does not change the meaning.)
Generally evaṁ means “thus”, “suchways”, “in this/that way”, “likewise”, “so”, etc. The exact nuance must be inferred from context.
It can also be used as an affirmative particle like the English “Yes”, “it is so”. Example: “Is that you?” “evaṁ”. In this sense, it is sometimes added at the end of Dhamma talks, affirming that “this is correct” and marking the end of the talk.
Don’t copy/paste, find out how to type Pali on your operating system. See Snowbird’s answer, and also find various discussions on here by searching “diacriticals”. Ask for help for your operating system if you need it.
But if you must copy/paste, you can use Wikipedia as a source.
A samaṇa is a member of an ascetic renunciate order such as the Buddha, who has given up the home life to pursue their vision of the truth. Samaṇas typically rejected caste. The samaṇas most commonly met with in the Suttas are the Buddhists, Jains, and Ajivakas.
A brāhmaṇa is a member of a hereditary caste believed to have a divine sanction to recite holy scripture and perform essential rituals. Most brāhmaṇas are householders, but some, following the example of Yajnavalkya, have left home to establish renunciate orders similar to those of the samaṇas.
The Buddha identified as a samaṇa in terms of lifestyle and philosophy, but he also redefined (or restored) brāhmaṇa in the sense of “holy man”.
Grammarians sometimes give these as an example of two things that are commonly put together but are constantly in conflict!
Pretty much, yes. But more along the lines of aristocratic rather than royal as such, since all kings are khattiyas (in theory), but not all khattiyas are kings.
They are often said to be a warrior class, akin to the knights of the west, but most of the khattiyas we meet with in the Suttas are not warriors. Soldiering had already become a professional rather than hereditary occupation. Still, Kings and their generals would have been khattiyas.
Yes. Manusso jīvati means “The man is alive”.
For us, none, they both mean “death”, and both answers are correct.
Marati means specifically “to die”. Cavati means “to fall away” and is often used in the sense of “dies”.
They have a similar basic meaning like English “speak” and “say”, but in context can be used in idiomatic ways.
- There is no meaning to vowel gradation as such, it is purely a phonetic phenomenon. The purpose of learning it is to understand that some words that look different are in fact the same. Eg., the word “descent (into a womb)” is sometimes spelled avakkanti, sometimes okkanti, but these are exactly the same in meaning.
- Usage is widespread, we encounter the same phenomenon in many different contexts.
- In some cases, the occurrence of vowel gradation indicates that a certain kind of transformation has occurred that is meaningful. For example bhava is “existence” while bhāva is “state”. Thus while the vowel change as such is not meaningful, it can act as a marker for a grammatical change that differentiates meaning.
Not a great example, as these are different vowels. Better would be child and children, where the initial “i” has been irregularly weakened in the plural. Similarly, wild and wilderness.
That’s fine. Sadly, we do not have the resources that the English language has, but the best available general dictionary is the Digital Pali Dictionary on GoldenDict.