One thing I’ve been mulling over is that with electronic texts we possess the ability to allow them to be fairly extensively configured based on a reader’s preference. So, if I prefer “aggregate,” or perhaps Ajahn Brahmali’s translation (which I’m quite fond of), over the Pali word khandha I can tick a box that will set which translation is used in the sutta I’m reading. Or I could chose, as a group, which Pali words that are already widely known to English speakers to leave untranslated, like aggregate, arahant, and nibbana. In an electronic text we aren’t limited to having to use only one translation.
We could have some something similar for all the repetition found in Buddhist texts. We could hide the repetition by default, but allow a user to view all the repetitions by choosing that in a settings dialogue. Of course, all of this requires a lot of work. So time and person-power are major factors in deciding whether or not something like this ever comes to pass. Before even thinking about attempting to add these kinds of features, we should collect some data from users to gauge interest.
As a rule, if there is a note that discusses a term, a phrase, or any larger piece of text, you can take it that the interpretation is less than certain. And notes are coming, so say the powers that be.
Then there are the cases where I was sure of the interpretation, but didn’t even realize my own ignorance. I will have to rely on feedback to sort those out. Would you like to contribute?
Sure, but some renderings will describe it better than others. A good translation will at least point the reader in the right direction. That’s sort of been my guiding principle.
I do see what you mean, and you certainly have a point. Khandha is actually quite close in meaning to “aggregate” or “group” or “collection”, all of which would be satisfactory renderings. And yes, “aspects of personality” is itself far from unambiguous and definitely weighted down by considerable baggage. Now that I think of it, maybe “aspects of experience” or “aspects of personal existence” would be better. (“Personality” usually means “character”, which is not the intended meaning here.)
Still, I am not very enamoured of “aggregate”. The word itself is not just technical, but fairly rare. It doesn’t sit well with ordinary speech. Would a spiritual teacher today use such a word to communicate their unique insight? It seems unlikely to me. They would use a a more natural language. My sense is that khandha is much more of an everyday word than aggregate. In part this follows from its fairly common use in the suttas.
But more generally, I think it is good to make the text more intuitively understandable to the reader. If you hear the phrase “five aggregates” out of context, you will be completely stumped. You might even lose you interest in the suttas. I think it is better to give a meaning that is imperfect—even potentially misleading, depending on one’s background—but that at least allows the reader to carry on, perhaps with an underlying suspicion that there is more to be learned.
I think the best advice is to find a good translator and then stay with them until you have a good grasp of the teaching. When you have reached a certain level of confidence, I believe it can be enriching to read alternative renderings.
We can certainly agree on this. And thanks so much for your thoughtful contribution!
Great! Please pass on my respects and best wishes to Bhante Aggacitta.
Though this is getting away from the Principles of Translation… I just thought I’d share… here is a picture of my favorite ‘souvenir’. I picked it up off the side of the road going to Jhana Grove, when I was last there. It is my representation of Not Self… and as beautiful as any Buddha statue
The rock (all over Bodhinyana and JG), that is nothing but a group of component parts bound together - No Self - just an aggregate
This is the biggest thing that I run into as a reader. There becomes a tipping point beyond which it makes sense to use at least some Pali or Sanskrit terms. One example that comes to mind is when a term like jhāna is translated as simply meditation, which does not help to deepen the reader’s understanding of the text. It also prevents them from being able to use the translation in their own personal studies.
As a reader, I like it when some terms like buddha, dharma, saṃgha, arhat, pratyekabuddha, dhyāna, samādhi, etc., are kept just like that. There are some other terms that I could go either way on, though, like ṛṣi, bhagavān, sūtra, or gāthā. They add flavor, and sometimes it’s nice to know the original word, but they could be translated without losing much meaning.
I agree wholeheartedly with regards to Pali (but I’m not so sure about mixing in Sanskrit). Some Pali words just don’t translate neatly into an english word and it’s better in the long run to investigate those words, learn what the Pali is conveying so that the suttas make more sense. For instance, I just can’t resonate with translating dukkha as stress.
I’ve always thought it would be useful to have an online translation that retains all the difficult-to-translate Pāli terms, but when you hover your mouse cursor over the term a little box pops up that gives a concise definition. This would allow the experienced reader, who already understands the terms, to avoid the dissonance of idiosyncratic translation choices and would also allow the new reader to gradually learn the terms organically, in the context of a sutta, by activating the pop-up whenever they need a reminder.
Yeah, I’m not sure what other translators use meditation as a translation of jhāna/dhyāna, but for myself that was a stand-in word for the time being while I mull over what to do with dhyāna in Buddhist texts. I finally decided recently to not translate it. It’ll begin to appear transliterated as I re-edit what’s been released already. To me, it’s such a specific and technical term that any translation is liable to be misleading. The word, whichever word we choose, is a label that stands for a stock definition that’s found throughout Buddhist texts. It might as well be a loan word.
I’m considering the same for samādhi given that concentration is such a unpoetic mouthful and doesn’t really apply to meditation in English (though it can get close). Immersion doesn’t get any closer to it for me, which I think is confusing to general readers. Any comfortably related word can be redefined to stand for a technical meaning if a person gets accustomed to it, but I think we might as well use loan words when English is lacking good parallels.
Except when you teach orally!!! I do know you try though you are easily led astray by Pali geeks like VK!
As much as I’m occasionally confounded by too much Pali when I listen to you teach, I’m not so sure about this as a strict principle for translated texts.
I feel like there are many instances where you can’t justify a single word as a direct translation, or that the term stands for such a broad and particularly Buddhist concept that an English word just won’t do.
For example samadhi - I’m well conditioned to believe that stillness is the closest English term, but if you said that to someone who wasn’t a long term listener of you and Ajahn Brahm then they aren’t going to come close to understanding the depth of what it means.
However, if it is left untranslated the reader still won’t come close to understanding it unless they have studied a bit more or had the benefit of good teachers.
So I guess what I am saying is that for a beginner, it is great to read the single English word, but for someone who has been around even for a little while it might be better for it to be untranslated because reading the Pali word will import a great deal more into the reading.
The question then is ‘who reads English translations of vinaya?’ Complete beginners? People who have been listening to dhamma teachings for some time and who will have a bit more conceptual understanding?
Another good example!
Yes!
When you say this, are you talking about a list of synonyms or other kinds of repetitions? As much as I love brevity, and I was specifically trained at law school to aim for this, isn’t the purpose of those lists of synonyms to aid in understanding a concept more accurately? Sometimes a single word can be misinterpreted where a list of synonyms will narrow it down a bit.
If you meant the other kind of repetition that is strictly for memorisation/oral transmission purposes then I’m a big fan of ditching it.
Yay!
Ugh!
Yay!
I like this idea very much. So much, in fact, that I’ve been doing that for a certain book you are ‘writing’ on the 37 A2A (short working title: ‘Just Remember Kindness’).
Me too. I almost always go back and forth with the Bhikkhu Bodhi books, especially with @Sujato translations.
Actually, I like that they are all different because reading multiple translations gives me a broader understanding of what the sutta means. Even when they contradict each other it is helpful because then it is a bit of a red flag that you should take extra care to reflect on the meaning and keep an open mind until you see it for yourself.
@Brahmali I am sooo curious about how this was done in the Buddha’s time. I’ve only just started studying this rule and understand that it is largely gotten around by declaring the extra robes as cloth for requisites, but to me that just seems like a sneaky trick to get around the rule rather than something the Buddha allowed.
Yes, I can relate to this. A problem is that we have a great variety in potential readers. When you decide how to translate, you first have to decide on the audience. Bhante Sujato and I decided early on that our translations should be accessible to newcomers. The idea is to give a smooth and straightforward reading experience to anyone who comes across these texts.
For more advanced readers, SuttaCentral gives display options that make it easy to check the Pali word behind any English rendering. Then there is the lookup tool which is very handy to get a deeper appreciation of Pali terms. To my mind, SuttaCentral strikes a nice balance that makes it suitable for readers of any kind of proficiency.
I mean both. Yes, a list of synonyms is “to aid in understanding a concept more accurately”. This works well in English. The problem with Pali is that our understanding of terms is often quite approximate. When we have a series of synonyms, it helps us pin down the overall meaning, but we will often lack a precise understanding of the meaning of the individual terms. Translating each term as if we haver a very precise grasp of the meaning is what Bhante @Sujato has called false precision. In other words, we are rendering the text as if we understand it better than we actually do. Sometimes collapsing a series of adjectives into a single word is actually an honest reflection of the limits of our knowledge.
They would probably have washed one robe while wearing the other two. There is some evidence that the three robes were roughly the same size. But the monastics also had other cloth requisites that could be worn. The nuns had bathing robes. Both monks and nuns often had sheets that could be used temporarily to cover up.
On the landing page of suttacentral, you’ve all done a great job in introducing a newcomer to an overview, ways to get started and a comprehensive index and glossary of terminology.
What about a very basic, concise introductory short list of some commonly found Pali terms which are difficult to translate and are crucial to understand correctly so to help develop right view? For instance, the word samadhi can cause lots of meditative anguish if misunderstood. Using the framework of the four noble truths and the eightfold path could cover many of these terms and at the same time help a newcomer discover what the Buddha’s core teachings are all about.
@NgXinZhao it’s 37 Aids to Awakening, and Ajahn Brahmali. He’s not actually ‘writing’ it though, I’m putting it together from a transcription of his retreat
And thanks so much for your thoughtful contribution!
I do know you try though you are easily led astray by Pali geeks like VK!