Dharma Pearls Updates

[cdpatton]

Now that my Github Pages sites is functional, I thought it would be good to split off a thread from “English Translations of Chinese” dedicated to updates and discussions. SC editors can pull the translations from Dharma Pearls at any time; you have a blanket permission to do so.

Now everyone else can poke fun at my translations or otherwise make suggestions. I’m sure there’ll be corrections to make and ideas I don’t think of myself.

The live website is at Dharma Pearls and the repo is at Github.

[Vimala]

Thanks so much @cdpatton. This looks brilliant!

[suaimhneas]

I like the website layout; it has a nice clean design. I’m of no use at all regarding opinions on actual translation but the translated suttas read very well IMO. Anyway it’s a site I intend to keep an eye on for further translations!

[sujato]

Nice, great work Charles.

[Javier]

I’m a huge fan of your work!

Sadhu sadhu sadhu!

[sabbamitta]

Congratulations! It’s a fantastic and very inspiring project!

[cdpatton]

Thanks for all the kind replies.

One thing I notice is the website isn’t very readable on my smallish Android phone, and over half of my visitors are mobile devices according to Google Analytics. I’ll need to fix that. I’m still stuck in the early 2000s and assume more people are web browsing with a desktop computer that has a huge screen.

[Gabriel]

Great project!

[sujato]

Here is a friend who might be able to help:

<meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1.0, maximum-scale=1">

[suaimhneas]

Another possibility with a bit more effort if you want responsive/scalable webpages might be to use the free bootstrap framework (more of a learning curve but not too bad really if you just want specific functionality). I’m no web guru but have played around with this a bit in the past. There’s a lot of stuff in that framework but you probably only would need the basic grid system. Your webpage ends up being organized using the bootstrap grid system (12 columns and rows) with nested div tags. You can structure it differently according to the device size (four main sizes: xs for phones, sm for tablets, md for small laptop size, and lg for full size). You can then even see how things behave as you expand out or scrunch down the size of your browser.

[cdpatton]

@sujato

Here is a friend who might be able to help:

That certainly helps. Thanks! I’ll need to create a css profile for smartphones to fix the menu, but at least its readable now.

@suaimhneas

Another possibility with a bit more effort if you want responsive/scalable webpages might be to use the free bootstrap framework

Thanks for this suggestion. It’ll probably help when I get back to trying to add side-by-side views to the site. It turned into a mess doing it from scratch and I shelved it for the time being.

In other news: SA 749-754, 758-761 have been moved over to the Github site.

[sujato]

The thing with responsive design, it is dead simple if you keep it simple. Excuse the profanity!

There’s a reason why, once responsive design came into vogue about ten years ago, pretty much all websites ended up with the same design: a top toolbar, sidebar, and single column main content, with side content in switchable extra columns.

You’ve got a single column design, so that’s good. But there’s too much CSS on the article width. Something like this works fine:

    max-width: 720px;
    margin: 150px auto 0 auto;
    padding: 0 16px;

The navigation needs work too, flexbox is your friend here.

@suaimhneas

bootstrap framework

With respect, I wouldn’t build a website with bootstrap in 2019: we have CSS grids now. And anyway, there’s no need for a grid layout.

[suaimhneas]

@sujato

With respect, I wouldn’t build a website with bootstrap in 2019: we have CSS grids now. And anyway, there’s no need for a grid layout.

Things certainly do move along fast in the web world! It has been a while since I dabbled a little in this. I rather liked the bootstrap framework at the time ( had lots of responsive elements apart from grids, found it easy to use, and it seems still popular). Looked up CSS grids now and they do look like a nicer more recent solution for grids. Was rather keen on the whole webpage grids structure thing. Personally, I think I’d have them on every page. However, that may say more about me than about proper web design in general!

[cdpatton]

@suaimhneas

Looked up CSS grids now and they look like a nicer more recent solution. Was rather keen on the whole webpage grids structure thing.

Yes, I’ve been in the backwoods myself re: web design. I guess when everyone was loading JavaScript libraries to extend CSS, the CSS people decided to just incorporate the functionality. No more JS bandaid required.

Eventually, I’ll be maybe using a sidebar or side notes or side-by-side presentations, so I’ll have to dig in that dirt at some point, especially in terms of handling small and large screens differently. ATM, I’m more interested in getting stuff translated, so I ditched all of that and went with something simple.

[musiko]

@cdpatton a big sadhu on your translation work and making it available in a way that everyone can benefit from!

I know Bhante @Sujato has very strong opinions regarding footnotes, but if you are looking for a slick responsive web design that looks beautiful both on desktop and mobile I highly recommend Tufte CSS.

I have used this design extensively when preparing Ajahn Brahmali---Introduction to Pali Offline Course---Wisdom & Wonders 2018 and there are some screenshots below that demonstrate side notes on desktop and mobile (in both cases notes are readily available inside the text flow but are designed in a way that doesn’t obstruct fluent reading).

@musiko

The interface

There are two modes for the UI:

• the full view, available to devices with sufficient screen width, with notes and audio player elements positioned on the right margin, where they don’t interfere with the flow of the main body of text

and

• the collapsed view, where those same elements are hidden by default and can be displayed on demand by the user when needed.

Touch the side note number to display the note text

All resources included in the package are either CC0 or CC-BY-SA or similar so feel free to use according to your needs.

[cdpatton]

@musiko

if you are looking for a slick responsive web design that looks beautiful both on desktop and mobile I highly recommend Tufte CSS .

Thank you, @musiko for the web design resources. I can definitely use examples like this to study when the time comes.

In other news, I investigated the GitHub Sponsors program further to discover that it’s a beta program that closed to new recipients. Instead, I reactivated a Patreon account that I had created early in the year that allows people to subscribe to my project at any monthly amount. I can also accept one-time donations at my Paypal account.

[cdpatton]

This week’s updates:

• Yinshun’s varga and samyukta headings have been added to the Samyukta Agama’s contents list. The sutra numbering scheme has been changed to a format that follows these headings.
• English translations of Sutras 1-4 of the Aggregates Samyukta have been added.

I’ll be continuing to work on the Samyukta Agama for the next couple weeks as I get drafted sutras (another 10, plus a few variants) edited and added to the new site. Once that’s complete, I will be undertaking a translation of the Ekottarika Agama’s Introduction, which spans the first fascicle of the collection.

[cdpatton]

This week’s updates:

• Sutras 5-10 of the Aggregates Saṃyukta have been added, which completes the first group.
• “Previous” and “Next” links have been added to the Saṃyukta texts to help readers page through them without excessive back button clicking.

Next week’s goals:

• Editing and segmenting the published translations of the Noble Eightfold Path Saṃyukta (SA 13)
• Editing and adding the drafted sutras from SA 13

Yinshun’s Text Critical Notes

Probably the most interesting thing I encountered while working on the first ten sutras was the insight I gained from reading Yinshun’s notes and observing his text critical edits of the Taisho. This was especially true when it came to sutra 8, which appears to have suffered from someone copying sutra 10 into it by mistake. Sutra 4 similarly appears to have a line repeated by mistake in one paragraph as well.

On SuttaCentral we have Analayo’s translation of SA 5 (SA 1.8 in the new numbering system) that reads:

“One who craves for and delights in bodily form, craves for and delights in dukkha . One who craves for and delights in dukkha will not attain liberation from dukkha , will not have knowledge and become free from desire for it. In the same way one who craves for and delights in feeling … perception … formations … consciousness craves for and delights in dukkha . One who craves for and delights in dukkha will not attain liberation from dukkha.

“Monks, one who does not crave for or delight in bodily form, does not delight in dukkha . One who does not delight in dukkha will attain liberation from dukkha . In the same way one who does not crave for or delight in feeling … perception … formations … consciousness does not delight in dukkha . One who does not delight in dukkha will attain liberation from dukkha.

“Monks, not understanding bodily form, not having knowledge regarding it, not being free from desire and lust for it, the mind will not be liberated. One who has not liberated the mind from lust will not be able to eradicate dukkha . In the same way not understanding feeling … perception … formations … consciousness, not having knowledge regarding it, not being free from desire and lust for it, one will not liberate the mind and will not be able to eradicate dukkha.

“Understanding bodily form, having knowledge regarding it, being free from desire and lust for it, one will attain liberation of the mind and be able to eradicate dukkha . In the same way understanding feeling … perception … formations … consciousness, having knowledge regarding it, being free from desire and lust for it, one will attain liberation of the mind and be able to eradicate dukkha .”

This is appears to be two unrelated sutras attached to each other, the first two paragraphs being identical to SA 7. The internal evidence is the uddana for this group of sutras. It only mentions the delight in form as the last sutra, which is SA 7 in the Taisho. This sutra should be the third of four sutras on lacking knowledge, which the second pair of paragraphs appear to be.

The second piece of internal evidence is that the first 10 sutras in Sense Bases Saṃyukta follow the same formulae as the first group of sutras on the Aggregates. The six sense bases are inserted in place of the five aggregates. The sutra corresponding with SA 5 in the Sense Bases Saṃyukta is SA 192 in fascicle 8.

We have Analayo’s translation for this sutra too, which reads:

At that time the Blessed One said to the monks: “If one is not free from desire for the eye, one’s mind is not liberated and one is not capable of rightly eradicating dukkha . [If] one is not free from desire for the ear … the nose … the tongue … the body … the mind, one’s mind is not liberated and one is not capable of rightly eradicating dukkha .

“Monks, if one is free from desire for the eye, one’s mind is liberated and one is capable of rightly eradicating dukkha . [If] one is free from desire for the ear … the nose … the tongue … the body … the mind, one’s mind is liberated and one is capable of rightly eradicating dukkha .”

SA 192’s formula is simpler, but otherwise it’s the same as SA 5. It doesn’t have the extra material found in SA 5 that is identical to SA 7.

The repeated line can be seen in Analayo’s translation of SA 4:

“Not understanding bodily form, not having knowledge regarding it, not eradicating desire for it, not being free from desire for it, one will not liberate the mind and be unable to go beyond the dread of birth, old age, disease and death. In the same way not understanding feeling … perception … formations … consciousness, not having knowledge regarding it, not eradicating desire for it, not being free from desire for it, one will not liberate the mind and be unable to go beyond the dread of birth, old age, disease and death.

“Monks, understanding bodily form, having knowledge regarding it, eradicating desire for it, being free from desire for it, one is able to go beyond the dread of birth, old age, disease and death. Monks, understanding it, having knowledge regarding it, being free from desire and lust for it, one will liberate the mind and be able to go beyond the dread of birth, old age, disease and death. In the same way understanding feeling … perception … formations … consciousness, having knowledge regarding it, eradicating desire for it, being free from desire and lust for it, one will liberate the mind and be able to go beyond the dread of birth, old age, disease and death.”

In the Chinese, it’s suspicious looking because the first occurrence of “monks” isn’t plural, the second line doesn’t have a direct object (form or the other four aggregates), and one line says the mind is liberated and the other doesn’t. But, mainly, it’s not congruent with the first paragraph.

Before reading Yinshun’s remarks and his notice of the parallel sutras that begin both of these saṃyuktas, I had translated these texts uncritically just as Analayo has. But the overall pattern in the first fascicle of the Saṃyukta Āgama indicates that someone was inattentive while copying it, and the text was corrupted with repetitions and missing terms in parallel passages.

The Disappearing Uddanas

Another thing I noticed this week is that while the Aggregates Saṃyukta has its uddana verses for each group of sutras, they are missing from the remainder of the Saṃyukta Āgama as far as I can see. The scattered fascicles (1, 10, 3, 2, and 5) that Yinshun reorders into the first saṃyukta all have these uddana verses, but the Taisho fascicles in between them (4, 6-9) don’t have them. What’s more, sutra groups sometimes continue to the next fascicle, so the uddana verses probably helped Yinshun decide the order the first five fascicles should have.

[cdpatton]

It’s been a few months since I updated Dharma Pearls, which was by design as I needed to attend to other work at the end of 2019. Unfortunately, though, the situation has changed as we moved into 2020: I’ve lost a large portion of my income that I was essentially using to self-fund my translation work as a part time effort.

When I returned to translating Buddhist texts at the end of 2018, I was hopeful that I would be able in today’s hyper-connected world to perhaps discover a way to fund a full-time effort. After over a year of part-time work, though, I’ve seen almost zero interest in supporting it. Without the ability to self-fund the work, and the lack of interest from others, I’m afraid this project will be mothballed. It may be revived sometime in the future, but I have no idea when that will be.

[karl_lew]

@cdpatton

It may be revived sometime in the future, but I have no idea when that will be.

Charles, there is a certain despair in providing food that goes uneaten and unsupported. As a parent, I once made a cauliflower dish for my son’s class at their campground. Nobody ate my dish. The kids all wanted pizza and hot dogs. I ate alone that night.

But I still make cauliflower. And last night my wife unexpectedly thanked me for making cauliflower. She said it was the best and gave me a hug that was worth waiting for, 20 years after that first dark night in the campground.

Please do not give up hope. There is joy and love in your heart to do this translation. Nurture that joy and love–even if you can devote only a moment here and there, it will grow.

p,s., I just checked Dharma Pearls. It is still alive and well and hosted reliably on Github.io.