The six senses cease, is there nothing else?

:pray:

Bhante,

Ah, that’s riiiigth! :laughing: I felt something was wrong with the tetralemma structure in your and Ven. Bodhi’s translation there (as well as in the 4th clause) but didn’t see :man_facepalming: that you both put ‘else’ in there twice! Which is not in the Pali! Now you’ve convinced me, hahaha. Thanks for pointing that out.

I should thank my Pali students also, because it was by explaining the indefinite pronouns to them that I realized what was going on. Sometimes it becomes so automatic to translate standard phrases (e.g. na kiñci) in standard ways (e.g. nothing) that I no longer look at what the Pali is actually saying. But having to explain it to others from the ground up, brings such things into light. When it comes to these kinds of things, we’re all learning together, is the thing.

I’m happy that you agree with my suggestion. If you implement it, it will prevent some unnecessary confusion among people, I’m sure.

While we’re on the topic, may I also suggest to insert ‘no longer’ into “the Realized One does not exist after death”. :smiling_face: Because the way you phrased it, it is technically true: the (imagined) Realized One does not exist after death, because “they” never existed in the first place. The point of the statement, though, is that they are believed to stop existing at death, which is why I think it should be ‘no longer exists’.

There was a whole discussion about this, where some were really confused about the statement (as I used to be). Others explained the statement “not exist after death” was based on certain ancient Indian metaphysics of absolute selves, but I think the issue simply lies in translation. Both you and other translators regularly translate na as ‘no longer’, and I think you should do so here too. Because a difference of time is implied: before and after death. (I think we may have touched upon this before with natthi?)

If you think I can help with anything, Bhante, please send me a PM. Fair warning, though, these both-and and neither-nor statements tend to make my head spin! :crazy_face:

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