A small question

[Jaldhar H. Vyas]

[apologies if this went out twice.]

On Wed, 8 Mar 2000, Raghavendra Hebbalalu wrote:

> namaste,
>       I have this small question. In devanagari or in
> English, all of us write brahma but pronounce it as
> 'bramha'. I saw a Sanskrit/Kannada movie in which an
> actor repeatedly refers to the 'brahma' (even
> pronounced that way) sutra. Is that a rule in Panini's
> grammar that hma should be pronounced 'mha' ? brahma,
> from 'brh' root, could very well mean that it has to
> be pronounced 'brahma' but all people pronounce it as
> 'bramha'.
> Please clarify this doubt.

The modern Indian languages have diverged slightly from Sanskrit
pronounciation.  E.g. Bengalis say b instead of v, Gujaratis drop a at the
end of a syllable etc.  'bramha' is probably like this.  But the correct
Sanskrit pronounciation is brahma with a hma.

Paninis' grammar doesn't but later grammatical works often include
an appendix with extra sutras to convert from Prakrit to Sanskrit.

--
Jaldhar H. Vyas <jaldhar at braincells.com>

--
bhava shankara deshikame sharaNam

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