[Buddha-l] Lamas and such

[Erik Hoogcarspel]

Dan Lusthaus schreef:
>   
>> About the use and meaning of the word xiao I have different data. On
>> CCTV there is a daily course in Mandarin Chinese and there is an online
>> course in Chinese called Chinese Pod.
>>     
>
> And you believe them. Too bad. Run down to your local bookstore and get a 
> bilingual copy of Confucius' Analects (e.g., Legge's version) and look for 
> the discussions of xiaoren. Report back to us when you're done.
>
> And in case you think that usage is restricted to the Analects, grab almost 
> any Chinese text written in the last 2500 years and see how xiaoren is 
> treated.
>   
Yes I do believe them, simply because I have many other sources that 
tell me the same.
It is just an example of the use of xiao in a friendly way in present 
Mandarin idiom.
You suddenly you shift to the expression xiao ren and that was not the 
subject of my mail, so in order to keep the discussion focussed I will 
not respond to that. It is of course quite possible to find ways to use 
a word in a derogative way, but that doesn't mean that it has a standard 
derogative meaning. As I mentioned, it depends on the context and the 
Chinese language is very sensitive to context, less than Sanskrit f.i.
> Muller's CJKV-English Dictionary (not the DDB) http://www.buddhism-dict.net
> gives three meanings for xiao:
> a.. Small, little, few; tiny.
> a.. Trifling, of little note. Petty, small-minded.
> a.. Young.
>   
So Muller agrees with my point of view,  2 out of  3 meanings are 
neutral or friendly.


erik