Diamonds, Thunderbolts, and the Impossibility of Translation

Some time back, on my Facebook Heart Sutra group, I argued along the lines that vajra doesn't mean "diamond" and that Sanskrit compounds in the form X-ccheda always mean "that which cuts X". And diamonds are, in any case, easy to cut. And this all meant that Diamond Sutra  was the wrong translation for Vajracchedikā Prajñāpāramitā. A chap called Leo emailed me to say that since vajira does mean "diamond" in Pāli (at least in the PTS Dictionary), Vajracchedikā should still be translated as "Cutter of Diamonds".

I had to admit that the PTS Dictionary does give 'diamond' as a definition (s.v. vajira², p.593). However, I'm a little doubtful about arguing from a Pāli dictionary to the name of a Sanskrit text and I don't think we should always just take the dictionary's word for it. So I checked a couple of the examples the PTSD gives for this definition and this led to some interesting reflections. The first passage is:

"Just as there is nothing that a vajira cannot split, whether jewel or stone" (seyyathāpi, bhikkhave, vajirassa natthi kiñci abhejjaṃ maṇi vā pāsāṇo vā; AN 1.124).

Now this one is important because here a vajira is contrasted with vijju (Skt vidyut) which definitely means "lightning". This suggests that vajira does not mean lightning-bolt here, and it raises the question of the the relationship between vajra and vidyut. And this requires a digression to consider Indra and his vajra.

Vajra

The word vajra derives from the root √vaj "strong, powerful" with the -ra suffix to make a substantive noun: it denotes an embodiment of power and potency. Compare this with the word ugra "powerful, violent, mighty, etc", which is very likely the same word, but with a prior change of vaj > uj (by the process known in Sanskrit as samprasaraṇa).

In Vedic texts, the vajra is most strongly, but not exclusively, associated with the God Indra. According to Mayrhofer, his name probably comes from √in "to use force" and means "strong, powerful". Thus the words indra and vajra are synonyms. Indra is used in the sense of "lord" or "master" and in the word for the senses, indriya, as "capacity" or "faculty". In this sense, Indra is the archetypal kṣatriya or warrior-king. 

In Buddhist texts Indra is usually referred to by another synonym, Śakra "Mighty" or "Able", and as the Devānām Indra "Lord of the Shining Ones". He is directly addressed as Kauśika, which is a reference to myths elaborated in the Brahmaṇa texts and Epics in which the Devas are no longer masters of the universe, but are entangled in worldly affairs in the manner of the Greek Gods. The Vedic-speaking incomers have now dominated Punjab and dealt with their civil war and seem more settled. Brahmin priests are beginning to assert their social dominance over the warrior kings. Śakra is a minor character in early Buddhist texts, but one of the main characters in the Prajñāpāramitā sūtras (where my working theory is that he represents the views of those who practice dhyāna meditation, because he is the Lord of the Devas and the devaloka which is equated with dhyāna). In Buddhist texts Indra seems to have lost his belligerence and his vajra, but not in Buddhist art where he is routinely depicted with both, although these attributes are more often associated with the yakṣa Vajrapāni (the one who wields the mace).

iron mace from India

Vinayak Mahadev Apte (1956) tells us that vajra does not mean "thunderbolt" in the Ṛgveda.  He also points out that there is only one rain god in the Ṛgveda and that is Parjanya; and if anything vidyut "lightning" is associated with him and not with Indra. In fact, Indra is not a storm god at all. The vajra of Indra is a weapon, one that was forged by Tvaṣṭṛ, an artificer god (= Hephaestus?). The vajra is a two-handed, metallic (āyasa) mace with 1000 spikes (sahásrabhṛṣṭi). It is thus described also in Pāḷi when wielded by Vajirapāṇi (vajirapāṇi yakkho āyasaṃ vajiraṃ ādāya MN I.231). In the Ṛgveda, the vajra is described as stable (sthavira) and durable (dharṇasi); it is habitually in the possession of Indra, along with his horse and chariot. Meaning it is unlike highly unstable and impermanent lightning.

Indra was not a storm god, but a warrior god who embodies manly virtues in a warrior society. "While Indra is many things, his exploits are overwhelmingly defined by acts of physical strength, violent contestation, or outright battle: these are his raison d'être" (Whitaker 2016: 58). Indra's weapon represents an embodiment of and symbolises these same qualities. According to Apte, other non-storm gods also wield a vajra weapon at times, especially Vedic Bṛhaspati.

The connection with lightning is puzzling. When Jarrod Whitaker argues that "in a few instances is Indra' s weapon equated poetically with lightning" (2016: 58) I am unconvinced. He cites one example (Rgveda 1.33.10cd):

1.033.10c: yújaṃ vájraṃ vṛṣabháś cakra índro
1.033.10d: nír jyótiṣā támaso gā́ adukṣat

"The bull Indra made his mace his yokemate. He milked the cows out of
the darkness with light." (Jamison & Brereton 2014: 138)

I think Whitaker may be confusing light (jyoti) with lightning (not mentioned). Apte noted that Indra is associated with "waters" in the Ṛgveda, but they have been misinterpreted as rain. In fact, they are the cosmic waters associated with light and day. The enemy of Indra, Vṛtra, who helps to define him, is not a demon of drought, as is often asserted, but of darkness (tamas). The battle between Indra and Vṛtra is the classic battle between light and dark. Milking and cows here are metaphors for the creative power (māyā) of the God. Indra is sometimes referred to as vṛtrahan (P.  vatrabhū) "the smiter or enemy of the Vṛtra". This name also appears in Iranian myth as Vṛθragna (Old Iranian), and Vərəθraγna (Avestan). (NB Skt han derives from an earlier Indo-Iranian √ghan)

Buddha accompanied by
"mace-wielder", Vajrapāṇi
as Greek God. 

There is an interesting parallel here with ancient Greece. Chief God, Zeus also wields a weapon that is popularly supposed to be a "lightning bolt". In fact, his weapon is called κεραυνός (keraunos) "smasher, crusher", not βροντή (brontí,) “thunder” or ἀστραπή (astrapḗ) "lightning". The noun keraunos seems to come from Proto-Indo-European *ker "injure, spoil" and is thus also unrelated to meteorological phenomena. As a name, "smasher" is suggestive of a club or mace.

In Rob Linrothe's Ruthless Compassion, we can see that wrathful deities, particularly Vajrapāṇi ("Holding the Weapon"), are depicted carrying a club or mace. And in Gandhāran art, the yakṣa, Vajrapāṇi is sometimes depicted accompanying the Buddha as Heracles or perhaps Zeus, often armed with a mace.

With all this clarity about what the vajra is and is not, we are left wondering how and when vajra was confused with the thunderbolt or lightning, let alone with a diamond. The mistaken reading of the celestial waters may have contributed, but it seems like a stretch to think that was all that was required to completely change the meaning of a word.

Coming back to the the diamond question, the second Pāli example is from the Dhammapada:

"For the evil done by oneself, born or produced by oneself;
Cleaves the foolish, as a vajira a stone or jewel." 

Attanā hi kataṃ pāpaṃ, attajaṃ attasambhavaṃ;
Abhimantheti dummedhaṃ, vajiraṃ ahmamayaṃ maṇiṃ. (Dhp 161). 

So there is clearly an idea that vajira (whatever it is) can split (abhejja) or cleave/crush (abhimantheti) stone or other gems. So now we need to consider what we know about diamonds.


Diamond

Our word "diamond" comes from the Greek ἀδάμας  (adamas), the mythical hardest substance; in antiquity, usually some form of metal. Marvel comic fans will be familiar with the idea of adamantium. Interestingly, the concept of the hardest substance is common to Greece and Greater India, but it is applied to very different substances. The etymology is uncertain: The OED says that it comes from dama "tame" and thus means "indomitable" (Cf Sanskrit dama) but other sources suggest it may be a loan word (from Persian perhaps?). The word was first applied to the gemstone in English in the 14th Century.

Diamond is a crystalline allotrope of elemental carbon. Natural diamonds form octahedral crystals. Such crystals have a high refractive index, a high melting point (ca. 4000 °C), and the highest thermal conductivity of any natural material. Natural diamonds were typically formed between 1 billion and 3.5 billion years ago, deep in the earth's mantle and were brought to the surface by volcanic activity. They are usually found embedded in igneous rocks. Incorporation of other atoms can give diamonds a variety of hues.

Until the 18th Century, India was the primary producer of diamonds in the world, though they were traded far and wide, even in antiquity.

Diamond is the hardest natural substance. A diamond can scratch any other mineral. We use diamonds to scratch glass, for example, before breaking it. By about 700 AD in India, shards of diamond were being used to drill holes in quartz beads (Gorelick & Gwinnett 1988). In modern industry, diamond-tipped drill bits using synthetic diamonds are used for high performance situations and for drilling very hard substances.

However, diamonds also score low on the "toughness" scale which measures the ability to absorb energy and deform. Diamonds are brittle. Hit a diamond with a hammer and it will most likely shatter. Granite, for example, is about 100 times as resistant to breaking as diamond is. Hit a stone made of granite with a diamond and the diamond will shatter. So the idea that diamonds can split stone is obviously false.

uncut diamond

In antiquity, diamonds were simply left in their natural state. They were not even used as jewelry to begin with. Around the 14th Century in India, steel tools began to be used to split diamonds so as to give them facets. This process is called "cutting". It highlights the brilliance of the gem, i.e. the way it refracts and reflects light. In the modern approach to "cutting", the faces of the crystal are polished using an abrasive wheel,  It is, in fact, extremely easy to cut a diamond, though it takes skill to do so with the necessary precision to shape the gem into one of the classic "cuts". 

In ancient India, diamonds were so rare, and thus expensive, that only kings owned them. As far as I can tell, up to the point of being called after Indra's mace, diamonds were known generically as maṇi or jewels. They were not worn as jewelry and thus most people probably never saw them but only heard about them second hand. The common people were apt to be maṅgalikā (or superstitious) so, perhaps inevitably, diamonds became associated with magical powers in the popular imagination. And the chief magical power is that the diamond can cut any other substance. It can split rocks and stones, but is itself uncuttable, unbreakable, uncrushable, and so on. 

Conclusion

In summary then indra, vajra, and śakra are all synonyms for "power". The original vajra was a two-handed, metal mace with sharpened spikes, wielded by Indra/Śakra against his foe, Vṛta. The word denotes an embodiment or instantiation of physical power. Semantically, vajra does not mean either "lightning" (which is vidyut) or "diamond". Similarly, the weapon of Zeus, also a mace, has no semantic connection with meteorological phenomena.

However, the mace of Indra became associated with lightning at some point and the name vajra was later applied to diamonds as myths of indestructibility grew up around them. The process of how this happened and the timeline are still unclear to me.

But given the usage we can make a pragmatic argument that vajra does indeed mean "diamond" in that the word is applied to diamonds and is understood to mean "diamond" in particular contexts (such as we saw in the Pāli passages above). However, the argument is weakened because the "diamonds" in question have magical properties and it is precisely these magical properties seem to be what motivated ancient Indians to redeploy the name of Indra's weapon.

So yes, we could translate vajraccheda as "cuts diamond" and vajracchedikā as "a cutter of diamond", but we have to footnote this with a reminder that the diamond in question is an imaginary magical diamond, not an ordinary carbon diamond. In other words, we can translate vajra as "diamond" it but it doesn't get us any closer to what is meant by the title since the quality being described doesn't exist in reality. 

The situation is a little worse, however, since the idea that vajraccheda attempts to convey is "cutting the uncuttable" and a diamond is eminently cuttable. Go to a jeweler and all their diamonds are cut. I gather that uncut diamonds are somewhat fashionable at present, but most people have probably only ever seen cut diamonds. Cutting diamonds is completely routine. And diamonds, while still expensive, are commonplace. So the title doesn't have much meaning when translated in a simplistic fashion. The idea of the title Vajracchedikā Prajñāpāramitā is obviously that prajñāpāramitā cuts the uncuttable. What this means is a mystery, however, because the text never explains it. If we stipulate the meaning, the next problem is how to meaningfully convey this in English? 

Funnily enough, actually we do have an English word that means "uncuttable" which is, atomic, from the Greek temnein "to cut". And, of course, it was a big deal when the irreducible atom was split by my countryman, Ernest Rutherford, at Manchester University in 1917. Though I quite like the sound of the Atom Splitting Sutra, in fact splitting atoms is almost as routine as cutting diamonds these days and there is a veritable zoo of subatomic particles. Also "atomic" is inescapably entangled in connotations of radiation and bombs.

My own habit has been to refer to the text as the Vajracchedikā and just leave it at that. It has the advantage of being unique. I note that although we can infer what the title means, it is never explained in the text itself. When Subhūti asks what he should call the discourse, the answer is "The name of this way of talking about the Dharma, Subhūti, is Gnosis Perfected" (prajñāpāramitā nāmāyaṃ subhūte dharmaparyāyaḥ 13b). On the other hand, the colophon of 7th Century Gilgit manuscript ends with vajracchedikā prajñāpāramitā samāptāḥ. "Here endeth the Gnosis Perfected that Cuts the Uncuttable". Note that the text does not refer to itself as a sūtra.  

I'll finish with a few words about the Chinese translation. Since Kumārajīva first translated it into Middle Chinese ca 402 CE, the Vajracchedikā has been known as the 金剛般若波羅蜜經 (Jīngāng bānrěbōluómì jīng). The part that interests us us 金剛 which is a binomial and means "diamond". It's a made-up term that translates vajra. 金 primarily means "metal" and sometimes more specifically "gold". It can also convey the typical properties of metals (of which gold is an exception), i.e. hardness, durability, etc. My Middle Chinese dictionary (Kroll) has a sub-entry for 金剛 "hardness of gold, i.e. diamond". But, of course, gold is known for being a soft metal in its pure state. It is, for example, the last thing you'd make a weapon out of. As we might suspect from the previous, 剛 means "rigid, unyielding, inflexible" and in a nice twist Kroll includes "adamantine" in his definitions; on its own the character is also used for "steel".

If we translate 金剛般若波羅蜜經 fairly literally it is the Diamond Gnosis-Perfected Sutra in Kumārajīva's rendering. And this is probably why the name Diamond Sutra was popularised. We may never know if the absence of a reference to "cutting" is a deliberate omission, or if the reference that we take for granted is a later affectation that was absent from Kumārajīva's source text. In my research for this essay, I didn't find any information on how the Chinese viewed diamonds.

In the end most people are just going to keep calling it the Diamond Sutra no matter what. Still, it is interesting just to reflect on how words function and change over time. The dictionary is not the last word on what any given term means in a text because many terms are defined pragmatically. As fascinating as etymology can be, it doesn't always capture how a word is used at any given time and how that use changes.

~~oOo~~

Bibliography

Apte, V. M. (1956). 'Vajra in the Ṛgveda'. Annals of the Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute, 37(1/4): 292-295. https://www.jstor.org/stable/44082929

Dahlquist, Allan. (1996) Megasthenes and Indian Religion: A Study in Motives and Types. Motilal Banarsidass.

Gorelick, L and Gwinnett, A. J. (1988) 'Diamonds from India to Rome and beyond'. American Journal of Archaeology, 92(4):547-552. https://www.jstor.org/stable/505249

Jamison, S.w. and Brereton, J.P. (2014) The Rig Veda: The Earliest Religious Poetry of India. Oxford University Press.

Kroll, Paul. W. (2015). A Student's Dictionary of Classical and Medieval Chinese. Brill.

Linrothe, Rob. (1999). Ruthless Compassion: Wrathful Deities in Early Indo-Tibetan Esoteric Buddhist Art. Serindia Publications.

Mayrhofer, Manfred. (1956) Kurzgefaßtesetzmologisches Wörterbuch des Altindischen. Carl Winter Universitätsverlag.

Whitaker, Jarrod. (2016) 'I Boldly Took the Mace (Vájra) for Might: Ritually Weaponizing a Warrior's Body in Ancient India.' International Journal of Hindu Studies, 20(1): 51-94. https://www.jstor.org/stable/44983842

Note: 29 May 2024. 

Slaje, Walter. (2024). "A Stone of Contention: Afterthoughts on the Rigvedic vájra – and Why a Mace is not an Option." Electronic Journal of Vedic Studies 29.2

Abstract: The present study deals with the widely held view that the vajra was conceived by the Rigvedic poets as a club or mace — the translation terminology of the target languages is not uniform. This is largely due to a change of mind on the part of Karl Friedrich Geldner, who revised his earlier view of the vajra as a wedge (“Keil”, 1907-1909) to the translation “club” (“Keule”, 1929) without giving any reasons. The great influence of his authoritative translation, only published in 1951, is demonstrated by the fact that, with very few exceptions, his later view of the vajra as a club was unquestioningly adopted by most later Rigvedic translators and interpreters, even though no dictionary gives such a meaning for vajra. This continuous practice has strengthened the unwavering belief in its correctness to the extent that it has spread as a firm conviction to all areas of research in Indology and related disciplines. In defence of my thesis that the criteria for a mace are not answered by what the Rigveda says about the vajra, and that a vajra should therefore have been some other kind of weapon, such as a biface-like sling projectile made of stone or lead, the history and rationale of the mace theory is examined and the plausibility of both assumptions (“stone” and “club”) discussed and compared. 

This article may or may not be an interesting contribution, frankly it is so verbose, so very slow to get to the point, and so prone to digressions and taking pot shots at other scholars, that it is difficult follow the argument presented. There is no simple presentation of the author's thesis or the relevant passages. I gave up. But I am still intrigued because the sling was a devastating longish-range weapon which could be wielded with high levels of accuracy. In the David and Goliath conflict, for example, David weilding a sling had the more deadly weapon. 

Lotus: Synonyms in Sanskrit

The lotus is one of the most prolific sources of symbolism and imagery in India—past and present. The growing habit of the lotus, which lifts flower buds above the mud, allowing blooms to unfold without blemish, makes it ideal for conveying ideas related to transcendence and purity. Girls are still routinely named for the lotus flower. Amongst Buddhists, names with lotus symbolism have long been unisex.

There is only one species of lotus, Nelumbo nucifera. However, the situation is somewhat confused because early taxonomists classified them together with water lilies, genus Nymphaea, on the basis of the superficial resemblance of their flowers. Older systems, including one still in use on the sub-continent, still classify the lotus as Nymphaea nelumbo. However, the lotus and water lilies are not closely related in modern taxonomies. They both belong to the clade angiosperm, but are from unrelated orders and families. In other words, the fact that they have flowers and form seeds is about all they have in common, from a biological point of view. Although the standard dictionaries attempt to assign botanical names to the Sanskrit terms, these are all from older, now deprecated, systems and are thus unreliable. 

The true lotus is an important food plant in Asia, especially in China. Young leaves, stems, seeds, roots and rhizomes can all be eaten. The fresh plants are susceptible to microbial infection and, though edible raw, are best cooked for consumption. The flowers of the true lotus are usually white with pink edges, though they may also be plain white, or substantially pink. 

True lotus showing leaves,
bud, flower and seed-pod

So-called blue and red lotus flowers are, in fact, water lilies. The two are easily distinguished. Lotus leaves and flowers tend to be raised above the water on long stalks, whereas water lily leaves and flowers float on the surface of the water. As with roses, most of the water lilies we see now are modern hybrid varieties. 

Water lilies

Although in Buddhism when we say "lotus" we most often think of the lotus flower, Sanskrit has words for specific parts of the plant, especially where those parts are useful, i.e., either edible or used for their fibres. However, I'm mainly interested in names for the flower, here.

I'll take the names roughly in the order given in Apte's English-Sanskrit Dictionary, with a few adjustments to cluster similar terms together. Apte lists 24 synonyms under "lotus", plus some additional names associated with specific colours of lotus.

Synonyms

The word padma is probably the most generic name for the lotus. It simply means lotus. Etymologically, it probably derives from √pad, "step", with the suffix -ma (Cf. dharma from √dhṛ + ma). Kamala is also frequently used but, strictly speaking, means "pale-red" (i.e., pink) or "rose-coloured". Clearly, it comes from the varying pinkness of the flower. The name nalina appears to come from nala, meaning a (hollow) reed, and may be a reference to the flower stalk. 

The name Aravinda or Arvin is quite a common given name in India. Notably, the Bengali form  is Aurobindo. The word aravinda is used to refer to the true lotus as well as both blue and red water lily. The etymology is obscure.  

By contrast, utpala is mostly used to refer to the blue water lily, Nymphaea caerulea (aka Egyptian lotus).  It means to "burst open" from ut, 'up, out', and √pal, 'to move'. The blue water lily flower opens at night. The word utpala can also be used to refer to lotus seeds and to the plant Cheilocostus speciosus, or crêpe ginger. Sometimes the compound nīlotpala (i.e., nīla 'blue' + utpala) is used to specify the blue water lily. It is also called the mahotpala, i.e., mahā-utpala or large water lily.

Another name for the blue water lily is kuvalaya. The etymology of this word appears to be ku, "earth" + valaya, "girdle, bracelet, armlet, etc.". In Pāḷi, Brahmins from the west are sometimes referred to as sevālamālikā "having garlands of sevāla." However, sevāla (Skt śaivāla) is a water plant, totally unsuited to making garlands. Pāḷi commentaries equate sevāla with utpala, which is more plausible. Note that Sanskrit words beginning with ku are often loan words from Proto-Munda. Such borrowing occurred early (words appear in the Ṛgveda) and at a time when the ancestor of the Munda family of languages was common in northwest India, a region where Munda languages are no longer spoken.

The term sarasija means "produced", ja, "from the lake or pond", sarasi. While abja and ambhoja both mean "born", ja, "in the water", ap/ambhas. A lot of the symbolism of the lotus involves highlighting that it emerges from the water as a bud and then blooms. Paṅka means "mud" and another similar term is paṅkaja, "born of the mud".

The two words śatapatra and sahasrapatra refer to flowers with 100 (śata) and 1000 (sahasra) petals (patra). They are lotuses by implication and often have esoteric significance. 

The term kuśeśaya is said to literally mean "lying (śaya) amongst the kuśa reeds." But is also taken to mean "lying in the water", i.e., a water lily. However, this doesn't explain the medial e. I can see no easy way to explain this and we have to say that etymology is obscure. Again, possibly a loan word from Proto-Munda. 

Apte lists paṅkeruha as a name for the Lotus. We also have related words saroruha, sarasīruha, and ambhoruha. The word ruha means "mounted, ascended" from √ruh, "ascend". Then paṅka means "mud", sara, "lake", sarasi, "pond", and ambhas, "water". So we have paṅkeruha, "ascended from the mud", saroruha, "ascended from the lake", sarasīruha, "ascended from the pond", and ambhoruha, "ascended from the water". Sārasa is another adjective meaning "of or related to the pond" that is used to mean lotus. 

Monier-Williams says that tāmarasa is the "day lotus". Rasa is the juice or sap of a plant and tāma is probably from tamas "dark". 

The word puṣkara is used for the blue water lily, amongst many other things such as the bowl of a spoon, the skin of a drum, the tip of an elephant's trunk, and so on, in a series of seemingly unrelated objects. The etymology here is unclear. One is tempted to say that it means "flourishing" or "that which makes one flourish" from √puṣ, "to flourish", and √kṛ, "to make or do". However, Monier-Williams argues against this. It is perhaps instead related to puṣpa, "flower". Nothing seems to connect the various usages which suggests that several words have become confused and merged together over time. It may also be a loan word. 

Bisaprasūna is from bisa, the lotus plant, especially the stalks or edible rhizomes and roots. In fact, bisa effectively means "lotus" and should have been included in the original list. It occurs in several compounds such as bisa-kusuma, "lotus flower", bisa-ja "lotus flower", bisa-tantu "lotus fibre" and so on. Prasūna is from sūna "born, produced" (from √sū, "generate") and means "bud, flower". Similarly, Apte misses out giving mṛṇa, "crushed", as a name for the lotus plant, particularly the fibrous parts, though not usually the flower.  

And finally rājīva, "streaked" or "striped", is used for the blue water lily. 

Apte then includes a few more words that are colour specific. For example, names specific to the white lotus include puṇḍarīka, "that which bears a mark or sign (puṇḍa)" , and sitāṁbhoja, "white and bountiful". The red water lily is sometimes called kokanada, though more specifically this refers to the bright red (koka) colour of the flower. Similarly, raktotpala (i.e. rakta-utpala) means a burst of colour (rakta), especially red colour (recall that utpala is used for the blue water lily). This word is also used for bloodshot eyes. One last name for the blue water lily is indīvara, "the reward of/for beauty" or "whose reward is beauty".

We can extend this list a little by referring to the Amarakośa, a thesaurus composed by Amarasiṃha, a Buddhist author in the middle of the first millennia CE. Further synonyms include: saugandhika, "sweet smelling"; kalhāra (or kahlāra), hallaka, "red water lily", rakta-sandhyaka, "reflecting colour", śālūka, "shining"? And finally, Kumuda, "exciting joy", a name used variously for the white lotus and red water lily, but also or many other plants and things that make people happy. 

Further notes

The plant itself, as distinct from the flower, can be referred to by feminine versions of many of the nouns, e.g., nalinī, kamalinī, padminī, mṛṇālinī, kumudinī, paṅkeruhiṇī, and so on. 

Many of the names for lotus are also names for cranes (e.g., kamala, aravinda,). Also, names associated with red colours are also names for copper and deer. 

Most of these can be combined in compounds to form adjectives of women as  "lotus-eyed", -padmākṣī, lotus-hued (e.g., padmā) or lotus faced,  padmamukhī.

~~oOo~~

Translating Pāḷi "Asuññataṃ"

Sāvatthī
(looking east)

My Pāḷi reading group is starting off this year by looking at the Cūḷasuññatasutta (MN 121). There's quite a lot of commentary on this text, a number of translations and commentaries, but even before we began to read the text we discovered a quandary in the word asuññataṃ, which only occurs in this sutta. Ñāṇamoli and Bodhi (2001) translate the word as "non-voidness" but I don't think this makes sense.

As analogues of the Sanskrit adjective śūnya (empty) and the abstract noun from it śūnyatā (emptiness), we find the Pāḷi suñña and suññatā. However in addition, and in the title of the text no less, we find another Pāḷi form suññato or suññataṃ, which is not found in Sanskrit dictionaries, though some counterparts are found in Sanskrit Buddhist texts. This form is often glossed over in translations as "emptiness", presumably because it is so similar to the abstract noun that the translators don't notice the difference.

I begin writing this, it is not at all clear to me how asuññataṃ derives and how to translate it. In this essay I will survey the uses of the term suññato and try to establish how it ought to be translated in order to shed light on the word asuññataṃ. My sources are the Pāḷi Nikāyas and Aṭṭhakathās (or commentaries), the counterparts of the Cūḷasuññata preserved in Chinese《小空經》(MĀ 190) and Tibetan མདོ་ཆེན་པོ་སྟོང་པ་ཉིད་ཅེས་བྱ་བ། (D.291), plus a few Sanskrit fragments.  

The Cūḷasuññatasutta

The passage that alerted us to this problem comes early on in the text. In Pāli it goes:

Seyyathāpi, ānanda, ayaṃ migāramāt-upāsādo suñño hatthigavassa-vaḷavena, suñño jātarūpa-rajatena, suñño itthipurisa-sannipātena atthi c'ev'idaṃ asuññataṃ yadidaṃ – bhikkhusaṅghaṃ paṭicca ekattaṃ

Before attempting to translate this, let me break procedure by giving the gist of what it says. This is the first part of an analogy designed to illustrate a procedure for gradually emptying the mind of sense impressions and thoughts with the goal of attaining the suññatāsamādhi "integration of emptiness" or suññatāvihāra "abode of emptiness". These seem to be equivalent to saññāvedayitanirodhasamāpatti or "the attainment of the cessation of perceptions and sensations" and thus also with nibbāna. This very important and interesting state I describe as "consciousness without content". One is alive and aware, but there is no content to one's experience. The ancients had no concept of a resting state network in the brain, so they struggled to make sense of this state. I imagine, for example, that something similar gave rise to the Vedic idea that Brahman could described as saccidānanda or being (sat), consciousness (cit) and bliss (ānanda). Dwelling in the state of emptiness one experiences only being, consciousness and bliss. Those who write about this state tend to assert that it does get any better than this. 

In this illustration of the process, the Buddha and Ānanda are sitting having a discussion in a palace or perhaps on a terrace (upāsāda), in the eastern part of Sāvathī (which places it near the river that formed the eastern boundary of the old city). This palace formerly belonged to someone who is almost always known as Migāra's Mother (migāramātā). Her name was Visākhā and she was actually Migāra's wife (that story is outlined in the DOPN). In any case it appears that the palace is given over to the bhikkhusaṅgha for their use.

The Buddha points out that the things one would normally find in such a place, i.e. livestock, wealth, and people etc., are absent, but instead only the the bhikkhusaṅgha is present. Buddhaghosa points out in his commentary that this refers to the bhikkhus as a corporate entity, not to the individual bhikkhus. This example of the palace and the bhikkhus is an analogy for the ascetic meditating in the wilderness (arañña). The ascetic notices that their mind is empty of the sights and sounds of the village and its inhabitants, and all that is present is perceptions of the wilderness which have a sort of uniformity. The perturbations of the mind caused by village life are absent, and only the perturbations due to the wilderness are present.

The question is, how do we translate asuññataṃ and ekattaṃ? Some comments on how to translate ekattaṃ can be found in Schmithausen (1981: 233-4, n. 122). I concur with Schmithausen's argument for treating ekattaṃ not as Sanskrit ekatvā "oneness, unity", but as ekātman "having a single nature" or "uniform". Buddhaghosa seems also to agree with Schmithausen at MNA 4.151 in his gloss on bhikkhusaṅghaṃ paṭiccāti. In fact I take it to be an adverbial neuter. This essay will focus on asuññataṃ beginning by looking at the apparent source, suññato. 

Suññato

PED offers the following definition:

Suññata (adj.) [i. e. the abl. suññato used as adj. nom.] void, empty, devoid of lusts, evil dispositions, and karma, but especially of soul, ego.

Here "adj. nom." means "an adjective in the nominative". The -to suffix is one way to indicate the ablative case. PED argues that suññato is an ablative of suñña (empty) that has been treated as a masculine noun and declined accordingly. This would make asuññataṃ an adjective in the accusative, going presumably with bhikkhusaṅghaṃ, and/or ekattaṃ.

Also PED sv. suñña defines the word in its neuter form suññaṃ "abl. ˚to from the point of view of the 'Empty'". Suggesting that suññato can still have an ablative sense mean "from the point of view of someone dwelling in emptiness". As we will see below this is apparent in some contexts as the word usually occurs with a verb of seeing. 

The primary sense of the ablative is from where or when an action proceeds, sabbato āgacchanti "they came from all sides"; pāsādā oloketi "he looks out from the palace". Very often this relationship is conveyed in English with the preposition from. In the precepts we abstain from certain types of action, and the actions are in the ablative case, i.e. pisunāya vācāya veramanī "abstaining from speech which is slanderous". The concept of separation (as in "apart from") is also conveyed by the ablative case. It is also used to indicate cause or reason for an action, e.g. sīlato naṃ pasaṃsanti "they praise him for his virtue". And just to complicate matters the cases are somewhat flexible in Middle-Indic languages, so the ablative sometimes merges with and can be used to convey an instrumental sense (with, by, through).

But why is an ablative treated as a nominative? In order to try to understand how this might have come about let us begin with a survey the use of suññato in the Nikāyas. It doesn't occur that often, so we can be comprehensive.

Occurrences in the Nikāyas

DN iii.219 Aparepi tayo samādhī – suññato samādhi, animitto samādhi, appaṇihito samādhi.

Furthermore there are three samādhis: empty samādhi, signless samādhi and desireless samādhi.

This is from the Sangīti Sutta (DN 33) which is a long list of numerical lists. Walsh (486) translates suññato samādhi as "concentration on emptiness" (i.e. he appears to ignore the case endings). Now the three words here—suññato, animitto, appaṇihito—all appear to be the same form so we can usefully look at the other two to see if they shed light on the derivation. The etymology of nimitta is given by PED as uncertain, though possibly related to √mā 'measure'; but PED also tells us that the gender is neuter. Sv. nimitta in BHSD it is also neuter. But if nimitta is neuter then it should not form a nominative singular in -o, but in -aṃ. Is nimitto therefore another ablative in -to, possible from nimita (past participle) from ni√mā? I'm not sure.

If suññato and nimitto are ablatives then suññato samādhi might be "the samādhi [that comes] from [being] empty". Which is admittedly awkward.

By contrast paṇihita is very clearly a past participle from paṇidahati (pa+ni√dhā) "to put forth, put down to, apply, direct, intend; aspire to, long for, pray for." We can understand apaṇihita as a bahuvrīhi, "without longing", as opposed to a karmadhāraya "undesired". Unfortunately this breaks up the pattern. So it looks like each word, though superficially similar, might derive the -to ending via a different route.

A variation on this occurs at SN iv.360 in the Suññatasamādhi Sutta (SN 43:4):

Katamo ca, bhikkhave, asaṅkhatagāmimaggo? Suññato samādhi, animitto samādhi, appaṇihito samādhi.

And what, bhikkhus, is the path leading to the unconditioned? The empty samādhi, signless samādhi and desireless samādhi.

Here Bodhi (2000: 1373) translated suññato as "emptiness", i.e. as though he is translating the abstract noun suññatā. However, the feminine noun suññatā cannot take an -o ending, so something is wrong with this.

MN i.302 "Saññāvedayitanirodhasamāpattiyā vuṭṭhitaṃ panāyye, bhikkhuṃ kati phassā phusantī" ti? "Saññāvedayitanirodhasamāpattiyā vuṭṭhitaṃ kho, āvuso visākha, bhikkhuṃ tayo phassā phusanti – suññato phasso, animitto phasso, appaṇihito phasso"ti.

However, lady, rousing from the attainment of cessation of perceptions and sensations what feelings do those bhikkhus come into contact with? Friend Visākha, those bhikkhus come into contact with three sensations on rousing from the attainment of cessation of perception and experience, namely contact from/with that which is empty, contact from/with that which is signless, and contact from/with that which is desireless.

This is from a discussion between Dhammadinā and her former husband, Visākha, in the Cūḷavedalla Sutta (MN 44). This is a very interesting passage about going into and emerging from cessation and the way that experience fades out and in. The question is literally "What contacts do they contact?" Phasso is in the masculine nominative singular. Here suññato as ablative case, perhaps overlapping with the instrumental may make sense and I've hedge my translation to indicate this. Ñāṇamoli and Bodhi again translate suññato as the abstract "voidness" (2001: 400). This passage recurs at SN iv.294 where suññato is translated by Bodhi as "emptiness" 

MN i.435. So yadeva tattha hoti rūpagataṃ vedanāgataṃ saññāgataṃ saṅkhāragataṃ viññāṇagataṃ te dhamme aniccato dukkhato rogato gaṇḍato sallato aghato ābādhato parato palokato suññato anattato samanupassati.

One regards as impermanent, disappointing, a disease, a tumour, an arrow, a calamity, an affliction, as other, as disintegrating, as empty (suññato), and as unsubstantial anything that is connected with form (rūpagata), sensations, perceptions, volitions, and cognitions.

The ways that one should regard dhammas are all ablatives in -to. And the context suggests we read them as meaning "as". So that te dhamme suññato samanupassati should mean "he regards those dhammas as empty". Here suññato cannot be construed as the abstract "emptiness". An important point here is that the cognitive action is taking place in a state of jhāna.

Perhaps here we can take te dhamme aniccato samanupassati to mean "he regards these dhammas from the point of view of impermanence"? We might argue, for example, that if anicca was an adjective here, then it would take the plural, annice, to go with the noun dhamme in the plural. Therefore aniccato which is singular is not an adjective and is not describing the dhammas, but is indicating from whence the verb of seeing proceeds. Thus this could be see as an example of suññato having an ablative sense.

This passage is reflected in the Saṃyutta Nikāya. At SN iii.167 the question is asked to what dhammas a virtuous monk should pay attention. The answer is:

Sīlavatā... bhikkhunā pañcupādānakkhandhā aniccato... suññato yoniso manasi kātabbā.

A virtuous monk should pay attention to the five underlying apparatus of experience as impermanent... as empty... etc.

Again Bodhi reads the text as saying that the khandhas should be seen as impermanent... as "empty" (2000: 970). Here the word pañcupādānakkhandhā is a nominative plural and Bodhi is tacitly reading aniccato as a nominative singular and the sentence as a simple apposition. Note that here also the verb is one in which one regards or pays attention to the khandhas. Buddhaghosa glosses sattasuññataṭṭhena suññato (SNA 2.333) i.e. "with the meaning of 'empty of a being'".

There is a Sanskrit fragment that parallels this (Thanks to Dhīvan for pointing this out to me):

(ani)tyataḥ duḥkhataḥ śunyataḥ anāt[m]ato manasikarttavyāḥ. (Anālayo 2013: 11)

[Something]... should be attended to as empty etc.

This passage recurs at AN ii.128 and AN iv.423, where is is again associated with the cultivation of jhāna and AN ii.129 associated with the brahmavihāras. Here the one who does these practices has a pleasant rebirth that is not shared with worldings (Ayaṃ, bhikkhave, upapatti asādhāraṇā puthujjanehi.).

Finally the word occurs in the Suttanipata Sn 1119 (mentioned in the PED definition of suñña):

"Suññato lokaṃ avekkhassu, mogharāja sadā sato;
Attānudiṭṭhiṃ ūhacca, evaṃ maccutaro siyā;
Evaṃ lokaṃ avekkhantaṃ, maccurājā na passatī" ti.

View the world as empty, Mogharāja, always mindful;
Having destroyed self-vew, one may cross over death;
The King of Death does not see the one who views the world this way.

(My translation more or less follows K.R Norman here).

Norman was the leading authority on Middle-Indic languages and particularly in his translation of the Suttanipata paid close attention to the meaning of every word. So the fact that he reads suññato lokaṃ as "the world as empty" is significant. However, he does not discuss this choice in detail in his notes, but instead refers readers to E.J. Thomas (1951: 218) who simply says that suññata is an adjective meaning "void". Note that here lokaṃ is an accusative singular and the verb once again involves seeing. Here, as above, I'm inclined to take the ablative as representing a point of view. To me this suggests seeing the world from the point of view of the suññatavihāra (as in the PED definition cited above).

So the modern translators seem undecided on how to translate suññato. Depending on unknown factors, since it is never discussed, suññato can represent the abstract (though the morphology is all wrong for this) and be translated as "voidness, emptiness"; or it can represent the adjective and be translated as "void, empty", sometimes with the sense of "as empty". In combination with verbs of seeing it can be thought of as "from the empty point of view". In order to understand how ancient Theravāda commentators might have understood the word we can look at the glosses in the Aṭṭhakathās.

Commentarial glosses

DNA 3.1003. Maggasamādhi pana rāgādīhi suññatattā suññato, rāganimittādīnaṃ abhāvā animitto, rāgapaṇidhiādīnaṃ abhāvā appaṇihito ti

However the samādhi of the path is empty (suññato) because of the emptiness (suññatattā) of passion etc, is signless from the nonexistence of signs of passion etc, is desireless from the nonexistence of desire for passion etc.

Here the abstract noun suññatatta (suññatattā is the ablative of cause) is telling. It points quite strongly to Buddhaghosa constructing this sentence with suññato meaning "empty". The samādhi under discussion lacks rāga, dosa, and moha or attraction, aversion, and confusion and lacking these is said to be empty (suññato) giving it the quality of emptiness (suññatatta).

MNA 2.366/ SNA 3.97 suññato phassotiādayo saguṇenāpi ārammaṇenāpi kathetabbā. saguṇena tāva suññatā nāma phalasamāpatti, tāya sahajātaṃ phassaṃ sandhāya suññato phassoti vuttaṃ. animittāpaṇihitesupieseva nayo. Ārammaṇena pana nibbānaṃ rāgādīhi suññattā suññaṃ nāma, rāganimittādīnaṃ abhāvā animittaṃ, rāgadosamohappaṇidhīnaṃ abhāvā appaṇihitaṃ. Suññataṃ nibbānaṃ ārammaṇaṃ katvā uppannaphalasamāpattiyaṃ phasso suññato nāma. animittāpaṇihitesupi eseva nayo.

Taking up the phrase "empty contact" (suññato phasso), it should be explained according its own qualities (saguṇena) and according to its basis (ārammaṇa). According to its own qualities, it is the attainment of the fruit called “emptiness” (suññatā). Coinciding with that [emptiness], contact with reference to it, is called “contact that is empty”. Animitta and apaṇihita are inferred in the same way. 

However, according to its basis, nibbāna is named “empty” (suññaṃ), because of emptiness of attraction (rāga) etc; [named] signless because of the absence of signs of attraction etc, and desireless because of the absence of desire for attraction, aversion, and ignorance. Having made a case that nibbāna is emptiness, the attainment of the arisen fruit is called "contact that is empty". Animitta and apaṇihita are inferred in the same way.

This section of commentary is looking at MN i.302 mentioned above. The subject is what someone who has attained the cessation of perceptions and sensations comes into contact with when they rouse themselves (vuṭṭhitaṃ) from the attainment. For them contact is empty or absent. In Buddhaghosa's view their attainment is nibbāna and they don't experience the world the way ordinary people do any more. Contact for them is empty, signless and desireless. Here Buddhaghosa uses suñña and suññato synonymously and suññatā as a synonym for nibbāna. Again we see words like suññato and suññatā being used to indicate absence. 

A short gloss is found at MNA 3.146: nissattaṭṭhena suññato "with the meaning without a being (nissatta)." Another as ANA 2.334 sattasuññataṭṭhena suññato, "with the meaning of emptiness of a being", confirming that nissatta should be read as "without a being" rather than with PED "powerless". The sense here is that empty means the absence of a being (satta).

Buddhaghosa, then, is more consistent in treating suññato as synonymous with suñño, and both as meaning "empty of [something]" or that the object is absent.


Sanskrit Udānavarga

We've seen one fragment that uses the Sanskrit equivalent of suññato, i.e. śunyataḥ. Skilling (1981: 226) gives a more substantial example. He notices that in the Udānavarga (a Dharmapada text) there is a series of verses that are counterparts to the Pāli Dhammapada vs 277-279, whence the well known triplet sabbe saṅkhārā aniccā, sabbe saṅkhārā dukkhā, and sabbe dhammā anattā. Compare the Udānavarga (Uv 12. 5-8; first lines only) 

anityāṃ sarvasaṃskārāṃ prajñayā paśyate yadā... [5]
duḥkhāṃ sarvasaṃskārāṃ prajñayā paśyate yadā... [6]
śunyataḥ sarvasaṃskārāṃ prajñayā paśyate yadā... [7]
sarvadharmā anātmānaḥ prajñayā paśyate yadā... [8]|

When he sees with insight all constructs as impermanent...
When he sees with insight all constructs as disappointing...
When he sees with insight all constructs as empty...
When he sees with insight all experiences as insubstantial...

Compare the Dhp 277 where the first line is sabbe saṅkhārā aniccā ti yadā paññāya passati. Here "that which is seen" is given as a nominal sentence followed by the quotative particle. In Pāḷi sabba is a separate word, declined as a pronoun (nominative plural), whereas in Sanskrit sarva is undeclined and compounded with the noun it qualifies, though there is no change in meaning in this difference. In the Uv 12.5 and Uv 12.6, what is seen with insight, e.g. anityāṃ sarvasaṃskārāṃ, is in the accusative plural, making it the patient of the verb of seeing. Note that word order is not important here, so the fact that the two parts of the apposition, e.g. anityām and sarvasaṃskārāṃ are not the same order as in Pāḷi, i.e. saṅkhārā and aniccā is not significant. As Dhīvan pointed out in an email, in Bernard's edition of the Udānavarga on Sutta Central, Uv 12.6 begins duḥkhaṃ hi sarvasaṃskārāṃ with duḥkha in the singular. Dhīvan suggests that we treat this as nominal, as in the Pāḷi, "When one sees with wisdom all constructions indeed are disappointing...". However saṃskāra is masculine and the -āṃ ending is unequivocally accusative plural. So perhaps "When one sees with insight all the constructions that are indeed disappointing..."? 

Now in Uv 12.7 the Sanskrit word is śunyataḥ (with śūnyataḥ given as an alternate reading) = Pāḷi suññato. One way to explain the short u might be that this is a loan word from Middle Indic which has not been fully assimilated to Sanskrit morphology rules that demand a long ū i.e. śūnyataḥ. Despite grammatical problems with Uv 12.8 (see below) the general outline here seems to be that all constructs are identified with a series of qualities, particularly: impermanence, disappointment, and insubstantiality. So we expect 12.7 to fit this pattern. We expect śunyataḥ to be just like the other adjectives: anitya, duḥkha, anātman. But it isn't. Whichever case we take śunyataḥ to be, (ablative and nominative are possible) it simply does not fit the pattern because it is singular and the noun it is describing is plural (though cf. the Bernard Ed. of Uv 12.6 which is singular). Adjectives take the case, number and gender of the noun they describe; predicates have to at least be in the same case. To qualify sarvasaṃskārāṃ we expect śunyataṃ. It appears that something has gone wrong in adding this line to the text. 

Lastly in 12.8 the grammar is mangled. Perhaps echoing the Middle-Indic syntax, here sarvadharmā anātmānaḥ are in the nominative plural (matching the Pāḷi equivalent sabbe dhammā anattā ti). In Sanskrit grammar this would make them the agents of the verb, which would be nonsense. Pāḷi avoids this by adding the quotative particle. The correct grammar, matching 12.5,6 would be sarvadharmāṃ anātmanaḥ. This error might be scribal - a missing anusvāra and an incorrectly lengthened vowel are certainly common scribal errors, but that they would make the exact mistakes in two consecutive words that would accurately change them to be the same (wrong) case seems unlikely.

Unfortunately this Sanskrit example does nothing to clarify the situation. Nor does Skilling add any comment on this point, indeed he talks as if the text has śūnyatā instead. The grammatical mistake in 12.8 makes us doubt the text. But clearly the person who added the verse at Uv 12.7 understood the sentence to be the same form as 12.5,6 and likely 12.8 as well (error notwithstanding). The only way I can see to make sense of this is to treat śūnyataḥ as indeclinable. It does not change case to match the noun because it cannot. But this is far from satisfactory because it conflicts with what we already know.

Having more or less exhausted the relevant Indic language sources, we can now turn to the versions of the Cūḷasuññata Sutta preserved in Chinese and Tibetan.


The Chinese Text

The Cūlasuññata Sutta has a counterpart in the Chinese Madhyamāgama, i.e. MĀ 190 《小空經》 The Lesser Emptiness Sūtra. The parallel passage in Chinese is:

阿難！如此鹿子母堂，空無象、馬、牛、羊、財物、穀米、奴婢，然有不空，唯比丘眾。(T1 737a9-10)

Ānanda, 阿難 it is like 如此 this palace 堂 of Migara’s 鹿子 mother 母，is empty 空無 of elephants 象、horses 馬、cattle 牛、sheep 羊、money 財物、rice grain 穀米、male and female slaves 奴婢，however 然 it is 有 non-empty 不空，of only 唯 the bhikṣu-saṃgha 比丘眾

The character for both empty and emptiness is 空, however we also see here the use of 空無 which can also just mean "empty, emptiness", but which might also mean "empty and without". Where our Pāli text has asuññataṃ the Chinese has 不空 which we would expect to mean "non-emptiness" and reflect Sanskrit aśūnyatā. But the lack of clear information on inflexions in Chinese leaves considerable room for doubt. Skilling notes that the Chinese and Tibetan versions are closer to each other than either is to the Pāḷi, so next (with a little help from my friends) we can now look at the last source on the list, the Tibetan version of the Cūḷasuññata Sutta.

The Tibetan Text

Amongst the very few Tibetan translations of Nikāya/Āgama texts are the two Śūnyatā texts (Skilling 1994, 1997; also Degé vol. 71: 250a.1-253b.2).  My thanks to Joy Vriens and Maitiu O'Ceileachair for help with understanding the Tibetan. The parallel passage in the Tibetan is (though see Skilling 1994 critical edition for variant readings):

kun dga' bo 'di lta ste | dper na ri-dags 'dzin gyi ma'i khaṅ bzaṅ 'di glaṅ-po-che daṅ | rta daṅ | ba laṅ daṅ | lug daṅ | bya gag daṅ | phag gis stoṅ ziṅ nor daṅ | 'bru daṅ | 'gron bu daṅ | gser gyis stoṅ la | bran daṅ | bran mo daṅ | las byed pa daṅ | zo śas 'tsho ba dag daṅ | skyes pa daṅ | bud-med-daṅ | khye'u daṅ | bu mo dag gis stoṅ yaṅ 'di na 'di lta ste | dge sloṅ gi dge 'dun kho na 'am | de las kha cig la brten nas mi  stoṅ pa yaṅ yod do || (Skilling 1994: 150)

Mṛgāra Mother's Mansion is empty of elephants, horses, cows, sheep, roosters, and pigs. It is empty of wealth, grain, money and gold. It is empty of man-servants and maid-servants, of workers and dependants, of men and women, of boys and girls. But with regard to one thing there is non-emptiness, that is, the community of monks alone. (Skilling 2007: 234)

Compare the translation of the last sentence found in Skilling (1997: 349) "there is still the assembly of monks, or whatever depends upon it, that is not absent".

Skilling explains, "here the Pāḷi has paṭicca ekattam, the Tibetan has kha cig la breten nas, suggesting *pratītya ekatyam, with the Buddhist Sanskrit ekatya [Pāḷi ekacca; "someone, anyone" BHSD] where one would rather expect ekatva—perhaps a wrong Sanskritisation" (1997: 349-350). This leave Skilling at a loss for a translation, but as I have already pointed out above, Schmithausen argues convincingly that Pāḷi ekattaṃ reflects Sanskrit ekātman which would I think would solve Skilling's problem. In a note (1997: 349, n.49) offers a tentative reconstruction of the Sanskrit 

dge sloṅ gi dge 'dum = bhikṣusaṃgha; kho na 'am = eva vā; de las kha cig = tato ekatyaṃ; la brten nas = pratītya; mi stoṅ pa = aśūnya; yaṅ = api (ca, tu); yod do = asti. 

i.e. asti ca eva [idaṃ] aśunyaṃ tato bhikṣusaṃgha pratītya ekatyaṃ. 

C.f. Pāḷi atthi c'ev'idaṃ asuññataṃ yadidaṃ – bhikkhusaṅghaṃ paṭicca ekattaṃ

Despite this, the Tibetan translator has evidently read an adjective here which he translates as mi stoṅ pa suggesting that his Sanskrit text had aśūnya at this point. Seemingly the unknown Sanskrit translator understood his text to be using an adjective. Unfortunately no Sanskrit ms. of this text survives to enable cross-checking. Sanskrit aśūnya would be consistent with the Chinese 不空.

The only thing we can take from this is a stronger sense that, contra Ñāṇamoli and Bodhi (2001) the abstract of "non-voidness" sense is not intended here. 

Discussion

Now I have to attempt to summarise a great deal of information that is often contradictory. Before looking at asuññataṃ we need to state again that suñña means "empty", and in this context something that is referred to as suñña is absent. So when the Buddha says to Ānanda, ayaṃ migāramātupāsādo suñño hatthigavassavaḷavena "this mansion of Migāra's Mother's is empty of elephants etc.", he means that there are no livestock present, no livestock to be seen. Contrarily if something is asuññata then we can take this to mean that something is not-absent or present. 

There seem two most likely ways to arrive at the morphological form asuññataṃ. Firstly we can take suññataṃ it as an accusative singular of the abstract noun suññatā. Various translators do treat suññato as "emptiness". But as some texts point out, the word suññatā in this context really applies only to the attainment of the goal, i.e. to nibbāna. In this view asuññatā would mean something like "presence" (an abstraction from "present"). However the abstract "presence" does not quite fit the context. 

Secondly we can derive suññataṃ from the ablative suññato. It seems that this word was originally combined with verbs meaning to see, i.e. √paś or consider i.e. manasi√kṛ with the sense of "as" - dhammā suññato passati "to see dhammas as empty" or "to see dhammas from the empty point of view" or a point of view that is empty of defilements or perhaps, according to Buddhaghosa, empty of a being. The word suññato was then lexicalised, that is to say it was treated as a word in its own right rather than a declined form, with the meaning "empty; absent" and treated as a nominative singular with an accusative singular in suññataṃ. (Which I admit is more or less what PED says, but now we know why it says that and that it is correct which is a bonus where the PED is concerned). The two derivations produce the same accusative singular, suññataṃ.

The etymological meaning of asuññataṃ would be "non-emptiness" or "not-empty" and as far as I know every translator has opted for something along these lines. However I suggest we can be a bit lazy about this kind of morphology in Pāli. We don't always think about what the word really means. A negated term often has a positive value and need not be slavishly translated as not-X or without-X. In this case asuññataṃ clearly refers to something present (in contrast to absent) or visible or something along these lines. To insist on using a word that preserves the Pāḷi morphology is no more sensible than preserving the Pāḷi syntax (a practice dubbed "Buddhist Hybrid English" by Theologian Paul Griffiths). I think we have to translate the word as "present" or "presence".

Coming back to the passage under consideration, the Buddha points out to Ānanda first what is absent and then what is present. What is present at the mansion are only bhikkhus, and because there are only bhikkhus they have a sort of uniformity (ekattaṃ = ekātman) when considered with respect to what one would expect to find in a mansion, including livestock, people, and wealth. As above I think we have to take ekattaṃ as an adverbial accusative.

However, as my friend Sarah has pointed out, idaṃ is a neuter pronoun. Later when asuññataṃ is replaced in the same sentence structure by the feminine noun in the nominative case darathamattā the associated pronoun changes to ayaṃ which is also feminine nominative. This suggests that the word asuññataṃ is a neuter nominative in this sentence and the only way we can think of this happening is if it is an adjective or adjectival compound that is forced to change gender to fit a noun or pronoun, i.e. a bahuvrīhi compound a-suññatā meaning "without emptiness". So, despite everything, idaṃ asuññataṃ must mean "this presence". 

Thus I would argue that our sentence ought to be translated this way:

Seyyathāpi, ānanda, ayaṃ migāramāt-upāsādo suñño hatthi-gavassa-vaḷavena, suñño jātarūpa-rajatena, suñño itthipurisa-sannipātena atthi c'ev'idaṃ asuññataṃ yadidaṃ – bhikkhusaṅghaṃ paṭicca ekattaṃ; evameva kho, ānanda, bhikkhu amanasikaritvā gāma-saññaṃ, amanasikaritvā manussa-saññaṃ, arañña-saññaṃ paṭicca manasi karoti ekattaṃ. 

Ānanda, just as livestock, wealth, and people are absent from this palace of Migāra's Mother and there is only this presence, uniformly dependent on the community of monks; just so, Ānanda, a monk doesn't pay attention to perception of the village, or people, but uniformly pays attention to the perception of the forest. 

Note that in the last phrase manasi karoti ekattaṃ the ekattaṃ naturally functions as an adverb of the main verb manasikaroti to mean "uniformly paying attention".

A few lines on, the bhikkhu who applies this practice comes to understand

Iti yañhi kho tattha na hoti tena taṃ suññaṃ samanupassati, yaṃ pana tattha avasiṭṭhaṃ hoti taṃ "santamidaṃ atthī"ti 

Thus, that which is not there (tattha na hoti) he perceives that as absent (suñña); however that which remains (avasiṭṭhaṃ) is there (tattha) and he knows "there is this present" (santamidaṃ attthi).

We can see the practice as like progressively applying a set of filters on experience, so that what we are aware of is gradually diminished until we are aware of nothing, or there is just absence. It's not that the world ceases to exist, but that we narrow our world of perception down until nothing is presenting itself to our conscious mind. Nothing disturbs the mind, nothing disturbs the deep equanimity of being in this state. And this, the texts tell us, is what Nibbāna is like.

~~oOo~~

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