Learn Pali Language

The Pali verb tenses/moods discussed so far are termed primary derivations. What is known as a secondary   stem can be developed from a primary stem by the addition of a new 'secondary infix or by the replacement of an existing suffix. √kar Primary base       prefix Pres. stem modal infix Personal Ending     - karo eyya si   present, opt 2nd per, sgl => kareyyāsi       Secondary base       prefix Pres. stem sec infix modal infix Personal Ending     - karo iya eyya si   present, pass opt 2nd per, sgl => kariyeyyāsi   Counter-intuitively, a secondary inflection usually precedes the primary inf

The term aorist  derives from the grammar of ancient Greek. In Pali, it can be regarded as a simple past tense. Note however, the use of the aorist tense in Pali covers both the simple past, the present perfect and occasionally also the imperfect aspect . For example, agami can mean:  he/she went" (simple past), "he/she has gone" (present perfect), and occasionally (imperfect) "he/she was going. It should also be noted that the past participle is often used for the past tense. The aorist verb is often used with the prohibitive negation mā: mā agamāsi =  do not go. mā atthāsi, = do not stand. mā bhuñji, = do not eat. Checkout this video tutorial on Tense and aspect in Pali. Tense vs Aspect & Participles in Pali Following on from the previous tutorial on tenses of the English Language, this tutorial looks at Tense & Aspect in the Pali language. You will see the difference between inflection and auxiliary verb... Formation o

Tense and Moody? Must be a Verb... Pāḷi has three moods  in the present tense, which are used to express the speaker’s attitude toward the action. Indicative : used to express statements, proclamations, opinions. Optative : used to express the hypothetical, and also wishes or hopes Imperative : used to express commands and invitations The conditional too is often classified as a mood rather than a tense, though it is most often placed with the future tense. With this exception, all of the above moods exist only in the present tense. Each of the other tenses has only one mood. We saw the indicative mood in the last post.

The inflection of verbs is known as “ conjugation ”. It consists of changes in form to show differences in person, number, tense, mood, and voice. In this post we will start our look at the present tense in Pali. By now you may have realised that the available tools (DPR & Pali Lookup) are good but not infallible when it comes to detecting the inflections of Pali verbs. Nouns tend to be straightforward, there are many groups but the ending are fairly regular. However, verbs and their derivatives can be very irregular and multitudinous and not all the variations are caught by the automated parser - nor the dictionary. This then can cause the amateur translator hours of frustration in their attempts to search for that one illusive word not in the dictionary.

Declension is the addition to the stems of Nouns suffixes which indicate grammatical category , such as: case ,  number  &  gender . Formally, declension is the variation in the endings of nouns, pronouns, & adjectives, by which grammatical case, number, and gender are identified. This subject is dealt with in many grammar guides and summary tables, so I'll be brief. Noun Stems The stem of a noun is the base form before any suffix has been added and are usually the forms listed in dictionaries. Noun stems in Pāli are regularly grouped into two divisions, those that end in: Vowels, comprising all the stems that end: -a, -ā, -i, -ī, -u, -ū, (o) Consonants, which include stems ending: -ar, -ī/in, -an, -at/ant, -as & -us

In linguistics, morphology is the study of words and how they are formed - their structure. So far, we have mainly focused on Syntax (How words combine to form phrases, clauses, and sentences). This post is an introduction to morphology (Study of words & how they change with role) before we move on to look at inflection in Pāli. A word can be deconstructed down into it's components parts, or 'morphemes', which are the smallest meaningful units of letters. Thus a word can be broken down into building blocks - morphemes - which in turn can be classified traditionally as roots, affixes and stems. Bits of words A 'root' is morpheme, which forms the basis of a word. It carries the basic meaning - which may be very vague and general. They are marked by the √ symbol as in the Pāli verb root √gam = 'to go'. A word has only a single root morpheme. When a morpheme occurs by itself, it is considered a root because it has a meaning of its own (e.g. the m

The inflection (altering of form) of nouns is called  declension . The classes of declensions are called  cases , and together they form the  Noun case system . In Pali, nouns, pronouns, adjectives and participles are declined in eight cases: nominative, vocative, accusative, instrumental, ablative, genitive, dative and locative. This post summaries the various Pali noun cases that we have discussed so far (and some we haven't). English has largely lost its case system although personal pronouns still have three cases, which are simplified forms of the nominative, accusative and genitive cases. In Pali, a noun is placed in one or other case as is required by its grammatical function in the sentence. With the exception of the nominative, vocative and some instances of the accusative case, the oblique cases as they are termed can be rendered in English by  prepositional phrases .

Two or more words combined together to form a single composite term is called a compound – e.g. blackboard, notebook, homemade etc. In older parts of the Pali canon, compounds are simple and seldom contain more than two or three elements: nāma-rūpa = name & form, ceto-vimutti = liberation of mind, But they become more complicated in later language: sīlasamādhipaññāvimuttivimuttiñāṇadassanaparibhāvitaṃ → sīla + samādhi + paññāvimutti + vimutti + ñāṇadassana + paribhāvitaṃ As a general rule, all members of a composite term are in their stem forms (no inflection of case, person or gender) except the final term which is inflected according to its gender, casting the whole composite to that inflection. pañca+upādāna+khandh ā pañca+upādāna+khandh ānaṃ pañca+upādāna+khandh esu The separate stems are joined using the rules of sandhi (joining) making compounds tricky sometime to tease apart. pañc u pādāna k khandhā → pañca+upādāna+khandhā The Digital Pali Reader

We’ve covered a lot of Pali syntax already and this post is a recap and summary. I’ve put together a quick reference guide to Subject-Verb Agreement to aid students (and myself ) when attempting to translate. This helps to determine which word belongs where... I’ll paraphrase Duroiselle & Bomhard here: Clauses in Pali have at least two elements: The “subject” — the person, place, or thing which the sentence is about – always in nominative case or implied. The “predicate” — that which happens to the subject. The predicate may contain: A main finite verb, in which case it must agree with the subject in number and person. A past passive participle used as a finite verb., in which case it must agree with the subject in gender and number. (Present participles never appear as finite verbs) A noun with an implied hoti ‘to be’ understood after it, in the same case and usually number, but no concord of gender or number need take place! An adjective with an implied hoti ‘to be’ u

Previously, we've seen how adjectives modify describe or add qualities to nouns . Adverbs are similar, in that, they are used to qualify everything else! In the tree on the hill , the phrase on the hill belongs to the tree ; it identifies which tree we are talking about. This is an adjectival phrase. Whereas, rapidly belongs to the verb; it describes the manner of the action. This is an Adverb . An adverb is a word used to qualify: a verb:      She swims quickly , an adjective:    She is very quick, another adverb:  She swims extremely quickly , or a clause:     Thankfully , she won. Let's take a quick look at each of these... Adverbs Modifying Adjectives When modifying an adjective, an adverb clarifies the extent of or intensifies the adjective. If we look at an example: a black bird sang Here, black is an adjective describing or adding the quality black to the noun: bird . a big black bird sang The term big also qualifies the bird . It too is an