[Buddha-l] the benefits of Jayarava's discussion

[Richard P. Hayes]

On Wednesday 20 August 2008 10:48:24 jkirk wrote:
> Aside from Richard's clever renderings here, just want to quibble once
> again as follows: If we say "all conditioned things are impermanent," I
> prefer (even if one is not supposed to 'prefer' anything) to impermanent
> the term, "transitory"--because impermanent suggests permanence. The dhamma
> does not teach permanence--so wouldn't _transitory_ (e.g., likely to go
> away) seem more suitable?

That reasoning smacks of the old canard that an atheist must believe in a god, 
for otherwise she would have nothing to deny. Surely one can believe in 
impermanence without positing that there is anything permanent to contrast 
with what one believes in. So for a term like "anitya," which is formed by a 
privative and a root word, "impermanence" seems like a good translation. 
For "vyaya," something like "mutable" or "changeable" or "transitory" better 
captures the literal sense of the word. Since one of the meanings of vi+i is 
to decay, how about translation the derivative word "vyaya" as "decadent"? 
After all, doesn't most of the discontent that people experience stem from 
their hankering after things that are decadent? (Or is that true only for 
Americans?)

-- 
Richard