Discoveries only a nerdy scholar could fully appreciate

“It’s the little things,” my roommate said to me today with excitement, upon discovering that his Mac version of excel could open Microsoft Access documents too…

Yea, it’s true.

Today – just now – I found this: the Digha Nikaya! And it looks like the WHOLE thing, in English! Even Access to Insight (a long-time friend of mine) has some gaping holes in the available suttas. Of course I had to discover this 10 minutes AFTER ordering a copy from amazon for $30.

Now the Majjhima Nikaya… that costs around $60, well out of my price range for the time being. Yes, yes, that seems to all be there too. Joy.

Now any good scholar will quickly warn you: these are in wiki format, meaning ANYONE can go in and mess with them. So be careful. That said, some studies have found wikis to be every bit as accurate as encyclopedias.

Then my Pali study-friend Matt found THIS. It is the ANSWERS to all of the Pali sentences that are to be translated into English (and vice-versa) for Narada Thera’s Elementary Pali Course. We had been beginning to struggle a bit with a barrage of new pronouns and even finding words in these sentences that seemed completely new, thus leaving us unable to translate them. But now… We move on.

Wow… The little things indeed. Now back to my work.