The Case of yogakṣema/yogakkhema in Vedic and Suttapiṭaka Sources. In Response to Norman

Abstract

Norman in 1969 emphasised a linguistic difference between the Vedic compound yogakṣema- interpreted as a dvandva (“exertion and rest”) and the widely distributed Early Buddhist compound yogakkhema-, analysed as a tatpuruṣa “rest from exertion”. On the basis of our analysis of the relevant Pali sources and of the more ancient Vedic occurrences—some of which are quite far from the earliest denotation of the two cyclic phases (yoga- and kṣema-) of the assumed semi-nomadic Indo-Āryan life—we have undertaken a classification of the several meanings of this compound, in order to distinguish their different facets and to enable us to easily bring about the comparison proposed by Norman in 1969 and in 1993 [1991]. Unlike Norman, we eventually postulated a common reading of this compound as a tatpuruṣa originally denoting an almost material target of welfare, from which both the Brāhmaṇic and the Buddhist usages, whose meaning is predominantly immaterial (ritual or wisdom-oriented), might have developed.