Hmm, let me check …
Authorship is unclear in these verses. Generally speaking, in this portion of the Therigatha, many verses are addressed to the nuns, or are otherwise associated with them, so we the fact that they appear under a nun’s name doesn’t mean that they composed them. Having said which, unless there are indications otherwise, it is reasonable to assume they composed them.
With Thig 2.8, there are two elements to help identify the composer:
- the first line is addressed to amma, which usually means “mother”. (More below)
- the final line was spoken by a woman.
The commentary says the first verse was spoken by Prince Abhaya to his mother, repeated here by her, while the second verse was composed by her.
With Thig 2.9, we also have two bits of grammatical information that help:
- the first line is addressed to Abhayā (feminine vocative).
- the last line of the first verse is by a woman; it is feminine, spoken in first person.
The commentary says that these two verses were spoken by the nun Abhayā. In the first line, she is addressing an exhortation to herself.
We can read that in two ways:
- per commentary, all is spoken by Abhayā
- the first two lines are an exhortation to Abhayā by an unknown third person, while the rest are by her.
Probably in this case it’s best to follow the commentary.
Now, returning to Thig 2.8, there is a tendency in the commentary to take verses under the nuns’ names and attribute them to men. So when the commentary says this I’m suspicious. That doesn’t mean it can’t happen, but we should be reserved about accepting it.
Regarding the use of amma, this is almost always used in the sense of “mother”. The only exception to this that I’m aware of is in Thig 3.5. There, the mother, out of her mind with grief, wanders about addressing her daughter as amma. But in that case, I’m pretty sure the use is meant to be a sign of her distress; she’s calling her daughter “mother”. Nor do Sanskrit dictionaries acknowledge the use of this vocative to mean “daughter”. So we are on safe ground to assume amma means “my dear mother” here.
We can read it as:
- all spoken by the daughter to the mother
- first verse spoken by the son, second verse by the mother
- first verse spoken by the daughter, second verse by the mother
It’s not easy to decide this. On the basis of the Therigatha alone, it seems to me that the sequence of verses suggests a connection between Abhayā’s mother and Abhayā. Since the daughter is mentioned right there, the economical reading is that it is she who is addressing her mother. And since the text does not require two speakers, it is also economical to assume she speaks the second verse as well.
Of course it is quite possible that the two names were just drawn together because of their similarity. But there is a detail in the commentary: it says both women were from Ujjeni, and both were friends (abhayamātusahāyikā). Unless Abhayamātā named her son after her friend (?) this seems an unlikely coincidence.
If we follow the commentary, we have to invoke a party who is not present and assume a coincidence in the name. And there is no indication that a male is speaking: addressers and addressees are all women.
Another detail is the use of evaṁ to start the second verse. This is commonly used by a speaker to connect something with what they have spoken before. I feel like it would be idiomatic, if this was spoken by the mother, to acknowledge, “practicing according to my son/daughter’s words”. This is not really decisive, but it seems to me like the verses read as:
Practice like this; when I practiced like this I realized Nibbana.
So it seems to me most likely that the two verses were spoken by the daughter. But it is certainly not definitive. I’ll put some notes on this, thanks for drawing it to my attention.
Seems it’s a head scratcher indeed.
