I've been participating in a serious Pāli forum recently. I haven't read much Pāli for a few years so its nice to reconnect. The subject of how to translate the verbs assasati and passasati came up. And I did a quick bit of research and a write up which I reproduce here. If I get any useful comments I'll update this post accordingly.
assasati/passasati
Assasati is from Sanskrit ā + √śvas, where the verbal root śvas means "blow, breathe". In Pāli, the long ā has been irregularly shortened and śv regularly becomes ss. Similarly, passasati is from Skt. pra + √śvas. The initial pra is regularly simplified to pa.
Under assasati, the PTSD refers to ā (1.3). This entry notes the use of the pair of prefixes ā and pa
However, PTSD confusingly gives "breath out" in its definition of assasati and assāsa.
This error and the correct reading are noted in Edgerton's Buddhist Hybrid Sanskrit Dictionary sv. āśvāsa-praśvāsa. By comparing various Sanskrit texts and their Tibetan translations, he makes it clear that assāsa (āśvāsa) means "in-breath" and passāsa (praśvāsa) means "out-breath".
And this makes sense in etymological terms also. If we look at the prefix pa (Skt pra), it can add several senses to a verb: onward, forward, forth, beginning. E.g., gacchati "go", pagacchati "go forth". It may also be used for emphasis. It would be quite unlikely to add this prefix to a word and have it mean "in-breath". Passasati must be something like "breathe-forth" or "exhaling".
By contrast, the prefix ā can have an indeterminate effect. But a lot of the time it adds a sense of "to, towards" or with directional verbs it reverses the direction. E.g., gacchati "go", āgacchati "come, return, arrive".
Thus, assasati "breathes in" and passasati "breathes out" are the expected readings. Although it's not so much "breathe in and out" as "the breath goes forth and returns". And this seems to be confirmed in later literature. The PTSD has been confused by the commentarial tradition. Which goes to show that the PTSD is a good dictionary but not perfect, and one should use judgement when consulting it.
One of the big problems that we have with translating is that some of our cognitive metaphors are different from ancient India. We think of breathing in, then breathing out. And we think that the breath is a movement of air caused by our physical movements. The air belongs outside of us and brings life-giving oxygen in.
What this analysis suggests is that in India they thought they breathed out, and then in. Breath goes forth and then returns. The breath belongs inside of us - like many ancient cultures, breath was life itself: words like spirit, anima, psyche, and soul all come from words meaning "breath or breathe". Possibly ātman does as well, though this is disputed.
The movement of our body and the sensations of breathing were caused by the wind element (vāyu) of which breathing was one obvious manifestation. There's not really a word for air as a separate stuff. Arguably, in ānāpāna-sati, you are not paying attention to air or body movements, you are paying attention to the sensations caused by vāyu circulating. Which is why you can become un-aware of gross physical sensations and still be focussed on vāyu. In this view, it is part of our being.
Pāli is a window into the past. But the past really is a different country.
assasati/passasati
Assasati is from Sanskrit ā + √śvas, where the verbal root śvas means "blow, breathe". In Pāli, the long ā has been irregularly shortened and śv regularly becomes ss. Similarly, passasati is from Skt. pra + √śvas. The initial pra is regularly simplified to pa.
Under assasati, the PTSD refers to ā (1.3). This entry notes the use of the pair of prefixes ā and pa
Contrast -- combns. with other pref. in a double cpd. of noun, adj. or verb (cp. above 2) in meaning of "up & down, in & out, to & fro"... ā + pa: assasati-passasati (where both terms are semantically alike; in exegesis however they have been differentiated in a way which looks like a distortion of the original meaning, viz. assasati is taken as "breathing out", passasati as "breathing in": see Vism 271)What I take this to mean is that ā and pa, when used as a pair, mean "in" and "out", respectively. But the Pāli commentarial tradition read them the other way around.
However, PTSD confusingly gives "breath out" in its definition of assasati and assāsa.
This error and the correct reading are noted in Edgerton's Buddhist Hybrid Sanskrit Dictionary sv. āśvāsa-praśvāsa. By comparing various Sanskrit texts and their Tibetan translations, he makes it clear that assāsa (āśvāsa) means "in-breath" and passāsa (praśvāsa) means "out-breath".
And this makes sense in etymological terms also. If we look at the prefix pa (Skt pra), it can add several senses to a verb: onward, forward, forth, beginning. E.g., gacchati "go", pagacchati "go forth". It may also be used for emphasis. It would be quite unlikely to add this prefix to a word and have it mean "in-breath". Passasati must be something like "breathe-forth" or "exhaling".
By contrast, the prefix ā can have an indeterminate effect. But a lot of the time it adds a sense of "to, towards" or with directional verbs it reverses the direction. E.g., gacchati "go", āgacchati "come, return, arrive".
Thus, assasati "breathes in" and passasati "breathes out" are the expected readings. Although it's not so much "breathe in and out" as "the breath goes forth and returns". And this seems to be confirmed in later literature. The PTSD has been confused by the commentarial tradition. Which goes to show that the PTSD is a good dictionary but not perfect, and one should use judgement when consulting it.
One of the big problems that we have with translating is that some of our cognitive metaphors are different from ancient India. We think of breathing in, then breathing out. And we think that the breath is a movement of air caused by our physical movements. The air belongs outside of us and brings life-giving oxygen in.
What this analysis suggests is that in India they thought they breathed out, and then in. Breath goes forth and then returns. The breath belongs inside of us - like many ancient cultures, breath was life itself: words like spirit, anima, psyche, and soul all come from words meaning "breath or breathe". Possibly ātman does as well, though this is disputed.
The movement of our body and the sensations of breathing were caused by the wind element (vāyu) of which breathing was one obvious manifestation. There's not really a word for air as a separate stuff. Arguably, in ānāpāna-sati, you are not paying attention to air or body movements, you are paying attention to the sensations caused by vāyu circulating. Which is why you can become un-aware of gross physical sensations and still be focussed on vāyu. In this view, it is part of our being.
Pāli is a window into the past. But the past really is a different country.
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