Intro to Lesson 5 – Residential Sanskrit Course

Summary:

We can now say “Rāma goes with the man”, and “Man reads the book for the son”. Welcome to Lesson 5, where we learn two noun cases (or declensions) of instrumental & dative. Word “about”. Our vocabulary expands further.

Source: Introduction to Sanskrit (4th Ed) – Thomas Egenes – Part One

Highlights:

  1. Video serves as intro to Lesson 5. Details will be covered when we meet in class.
  2. Instrumental declension:

    • What is it?
      • Expresses “with SOMETHING” or “by means of SOMETHING“.
      • EG: Man goes with the horse / Man goes by means of a horse.
    • How to form?
      • stemena   saha/vinā (with/without)
      • EG:
        • Rāma goes with the son       : rāmaḥ putreṇa saha gacchati
        • Rāma goes without the son : rāmaḥ putreṇa vinā gacchati
  3. Dative declension:

    • What is it?
      • Expresses “for SOMETHING“, or “to SOMETHING“.
      • Expresses an indirect PURPOSE or INTENTION or AGENDA behind the action.
      • EG: Woman goes for the fruit / Man goes to work for/to earn money.
    • How to form?
      • stemāya
      • EG:
        • Men stand for Rāma                       : narāḥ rāmāya tiṣṭhanti
        • Boy goes to the man for the deer : bālaḥ mṛgāya naram gacchati
  4. General order while mixing NOM, ACC, INST, DAT:
    • NOM INST DAT ACC VERB
    • EG:
      • bālaḥ vīreṇa saha nṛpāya pustakam paṭhati : Boy reads the book with the hero for the king.
  5. How to say “about”:

    • EG:
      • Rāma speaks to the hero about the elephants                     : rāmaḥ gajān vīram vadati
      • Boy asks the man about the two elephants with the hero : bālaḥ vīreṇa saha gajāu naram pṛcchati
    • Logic of placement: About word is in ACC. And further away from the verb.

Homework:

  1. Verse: What Burden is Excessive?
  2. Spoken Sanskrit: Week 4
  3. In devanāgarī, attach vowels to each letter in all 5 rows. (L6, pg55-57).
    • EG: ga ( ग ), gā ( गा ), gi ( गि ), gī ( गी ), gu ( गु ), gū ( गू ), gṛ ( गृ ), gṝ ( गॄ ), ge ( गे ), gai ( गै ), go ( गो ), gau ( गौ )
  4. Memorize the “nara” cases for instrumental & dative. (L5, pg46)
  5. Remember the new vocabulary. (L5, pg47)
  6. Complete exercises in Lesson 5. (L5, pg48-51)
  7. Free time (in bathroom/shower/eating/driving/etc)? Create questions using all vocabulary.
    • katham: how?
    • kutra    : where?
    • kim       : what?
    • kaḥ        : who?
    • kadā     : when?

 

Kids Playground: (For sparetime practice)

kids-friendly-sanskrit-games-for-memorization-yesvedanta-3Enjoy learning with pictures? Here's a kids friendly version of everything we've done in the course so far.

Adults are recommended the “Sentence Generator” for practice on the go.

For iOS/Android, download free “BookWidgets” app.

 

 

  • Match Verbs
  • Match Nouns – 1

  • Match Nouns – 2
  • Sentence Generator (Eng > Sanskrit)

 

Questions:

You'll have more questions throughout the course. How to ask? Leave in comments below, so others can also benefit. I will respond in 48 hours. Only ask specific to Lesson.

 

—

Recorded 14 May, 2020

Lesson 4 Intro
Index
Lesson 6

 

4 Comments

  1. Hey Andre. I have a few questions and clarifications regarding lesson 5 exercises.

    5d) Answer in book is putreṇa saha vīraḥ vasati. Can this also be translated as vīraḥ putreṇa saha vasati?

    5e) For confirmation, in this answer, bālaḥ nṛpam pṛcchati nṛpaḥ ca smarati,the word ca is placed after nṛpaḥ because that is the end of the list consisting of boy and king?

    5f) Answer in book is putreṇa saha tatra gajāḥ na bhavanti,can this also be translated as tatra gajāh putreṇa saha na bhavanti?

    5j) Answer in book is tatra gajāḥ aśvaiḥ saha bhavanti, can this also be translated as asvaiḥ saha tatra gajāḥ bhavanti?

    6a) Answer in book is tatra bālābhyām saha nṛpaḥ vasati, can this also be translated as tatra nṛpaḥ bālābhyām saha vasati or bālābhyām saha tatra nṛpaḥ vasati

    6b) Answer in book is kutra gajaiḥ saha gacchasi, can this also be translated as gajaiḥ saha kutra gacchasi

    6c)Answer in book is tatra naraḥ aśvāya gacchati, can this be translated as aśvāya tatra naraḥ gacchati

    The thing that confused me this lesson was placement of tatra. Is there a rule? My guess is tatra as an adverb of place goes at the start of the sentence, and as a pronoun goes before the noun?

    However 4b and 6d break that rule, so I have no idea 🙂

    Cheers

    Tom

    Reply

  2. 5d) Two Safe Options for Word Order:

    1) NOM (all other cases in between) VERB.
    EG: Man goes to the son > naraḥ putram gacchati

    2) (all other cases) NOM VERB.
    (Closer to English where verb immediately follows subject. EG: Man goes to the son > putram naraḥ gacchati

    The ratio between 1/2 in real life is 50/50. Thereby need to be comfortable with both.

    ——

    5e) Formula for “ca”:

    EG 1: Krishna speaks to Arjuna, AND Arjuna listens to Krishna > Krishna speaks to Arjuna, Arjuna AND listens to Krishna.

    Watch how AND placed itself right after the subject.

    EG2: Tom reads the book, AND the book teaches him > Tom reads the book, book AND teaches him.

    Please create EG3 using above formula.

    ——

    5f) There are no elephants with the son:

    tatra gajāh putreṇa saha na bhavanti > Correct. And how I’d write it.

    Why is it correct?

    Which one makes sense below:

    There are no elephants with the son.
    With the son, there are no elephants.
    There, with the son, elephants are not.

    All three, we understand. In Sanskrit, same it is. 🙂

    ——

    5j)
    Elephants (are there) with the horses:

    1) Andre’s logic:

    gajāḥ aśvaiḥ saha TATRA bhavanti.

    “There” is closest to the verb in English, hence it’s closest to verb in Sanskrit.

    Hero goes there (for the boy) (with the horse). > “There” is closet to the verb. “For the boy” is 2nd closest to the verb.

    Hence replicate logic in Sanskrit: vīraḥ aśvena saha bālāya TATRA gacchati

    2) asvaiḥ saha tatra gajāḥ bhavanti > Correct.

    ——

    7a) All 3 correct.

    ——

    7b) Strictly, incorrect. Even though it’s perfectly understood.

    Question word is first in sentence in English (or any language). Same in Sanskrit.

    ——

    7c) aśvāya tatra naraḥ gacchati > For the horse, there the man goes > The man goes there for the horse. Yep. Correct!

    Also consider Andre’s logic in 5j: naraḥ aśvāya tatra gacchati

    Because as we go deeper into book, we’ll see, the word closest to verb in English, will be (I believe in 99% of cases), also closest to verb in Sanskrit.

    ——

    The thing that confused me this lesson was placement of tatra. Is there a rule? See 5j.

    ——

    “4b and 6d break that rule” > What we meant in 5f above.

    SUMMARY: Homework is 100% satisfactory. Except 7b.

    Move onto Lesson 6 (email was sent) only after understanding important 5j logic. It’s a universal answer for “What goes where”.

    Reply

  3. Thank you so much for the thorough response. The use of ‘tatra’ makes sense.

    In response to 5e)

    EG 3: The son speaks to rāma, and rāma stands. -> The son speaks to rāma, rāma AND stands -> putraḥ rāmam vadati rāmaḥ ca tiṣḥtati

    I haven’t received the email, can you please try once more? tjohehir@gmail.com

    Thanks so much Andre!

    Reply

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