Vinaya Texts, Part II · 189 of 189

Note on Abhihatthum

In the 7th Nissaggiya, in the 34th Pâkittiya, and in the 36th Pâkittiya there occurs the phrase abhihatthum pavâreyya, regarding the correct translation of which, as will be seen from the note on the first passage, we were in doubt. The connection is always ‘if A should offer B,’ &c.; and the only difficulty is the force of the word abhihatthum which precedes the ‘should offer,’ and in some way qualifies it. In all three passages the Old Commentary preserved in the Sutta-Vibhaṅga explains the two words abhihatthum pavâreyya by ‘Take just as much as you want’ (yâvatakam ikkhasi tâvatakam ganhâhi), which does not solve the difficulty. On the following words of the third passage, however, the Old Commentary (see H. O., ‘Vinaya Pitakam,’ vol. iv, p. 84) uses the word abhiharati in its usual sense of ‘he brings up to, offers to, hands over to,’ as practically equivalent to abhihatthum pavâreti; and Buddhaghosa, in the Samanta Pâsâdikâ on the 7th Nissaggiya, uses abhiharitvâ as directly equivalent to abhihatthum.

Now in a passage quoted from the Thera-gâthâ in H. O.’s ‘Buddha, sein Leben, seine Lehre, and seine Gemeinde’ (p. 425, note 1), nikkhamitumna occurs as the gerund of nikkhamati instead of nikkhamitvâna. The existence in Prâkrit of corresponding gerunds in -tu, -tum for -tvâ, and in -tûna, -tuâna for -tvâna, is laid down in Hemakandra II, 146 (Pischel, vol. i, p. 62). And Professor Weber has given corresponding forms (âhattu, kattu, &c.) from the Gain dialect in his Bhagavatî I, p. 433.

What we have in the phrase in question is therefore simply a gerund in -tum, and the two words taken together mean, ‘if A should lay before and offer to B,’ &c. The thing offered in one case is robes, in the other two cases food; and abhiharati is the usual word in Pâli for serving food, laying it before another person. Compare thâli-pâka-satâni abhihari at Gâtaka I, 186; and the phrase bhattâbhihâro abhihâriyittha constantly repeated in the Mahâ-sudassana Sutta (Rh. D., ‘Buddhist Suttas,’ in the last paragraph of chap. II, § 12, 29, 31, 33, 37).