Tibetan Grammar - 'la don' particles

Other articles from the Tibetan Grammar series:
[Tibetan Grammar - Introduction] [Tibetan Grammar - 'la don' particles]

The 'la don' particles

Case	Particles
Second Case: Objective Case, ལས་སུ་བྱ་བའི་སྒྲ་	སུ་, རུ་, ཏུ་, དུ་, ན་, ར་, ལ་
Fourth Case: Purposive Case, དགོས་ཆེད་ཀྱི་སྒྲ་	སུ་, རུ་, ཏུ་, དུ་, ན་, ར་, ལ་
Seventh Case: Locative Case, རྟེན་གནས་ཀྱི་སྒྲ་	སུ་, རུ་, ཏུ་, དུ་, ན་, ར་, ལ་

Each of these three Tibetan cases refer to the same set of seven particles. These are the la don particles ལ་, ན་, སུ་, རུ་, ཏུ་, དུ་, ར་. The la don particles are in essence three particles ལ་, ན་ and སུ་རུ་ཏུ་དུ་ར་¹ which have overlapping usages within these three cases.

Note: There is no connection between the fact that there are three particles and three cases. The three cases come from Sanskrit grammar which was used to describe Tibetan grammar. It is a coincidence that the three Tibetan particles—combined as the la don—express functions found in the three Sanskrit cases. The three different particles of the la don are not identical in their usage. And though Tibetan grammarians generally try to establish an at least nominal equivalence among them, practically this equivalence does not appear. Because of their overlapping usage and the Tibetan way of combining them as la don these three particles are treated together. An exclusive or predominate usage of the particles for a given function will be pointed out.

¹ སུ་རུ་ཏུ་དུ་ར་ are the different spellings of one particle

Independent of verb type

Location in space

Place of activity

(Tib. ལས་སུ་བྱ་བའི་སྒྲ་, Objective case)

སངས་རྒྱས་ཀྱིས་རྒྱ་གར་ལ་ཆོས་བསྟན།

Buddha          India      Dharma taught

The Buddha taught the Dharma in India.

Direction

ཞིང་ལ་ཆུ་འདྲེན།

field water irrigate

to irrigate the field

Location in time

Locative case

དེའི་ཚེ་ན་

that time

at that time

ཁོ་ཡུན་རིང་དུ་ལྷ་སར་བསྡད།

he time long Lhasa stayed

He stayed a long time in Lhasa.

དུས་དང་གནས་སྐབས་ཐམས་ཅད་དུ་འཆི་བ་ཁོ་ན་སྒོམས།

time     circumstance   all            death   only meditate

At all times and circumstances meditate only on death.

Adverb of time with ན་

from སྔ་མ་: "in the past, before, past time, earlier"

སྔ་ན earlier, previously

སྔ་ན་མེད་པ་ previously nonexistent

དུས་སྔ་མ་ནས་ད་ལྟའི་བར་

time former now until

from former times to now

Note: also སྔར་ "in the past, preceding, former, before", with a frozen la don (see: "frozen particles")

སྔར་ནས་འདྲིས་པའི་གྲོགས་པོ་

past  to be acquainted  friend

the friend [one] is acquainted with from the past

Purpose

ཞིང་པ་རྣམས་ཀྱིས་ལོ་ཏོག་སྨིན་པ་ལ་ཆུ་འདྲེན།

farmer pl.        the crop  ripen     water irrigate

The farmers irrigate for the ripening of the crop.

Referential qualifier (ལ་)

མོ་ལ་བུ་ཞིག་སྐྱེས།

she child a born

A child was born to her.

ང་ལ་ཁྱོད་ཀྱི་སྡིག་པའི་ལས་མི་ཆུང་ངོ།།

I     you      evil     deeds not small

For me your evil deeds are not small.

སེམས་ཅན་ཆེན་པོ་ཐམས་ཅད་ལ་བུ་གཅིག་པ་དང་འདྲ།

Mahasattva          all             son   same    similar, like

Mahasattva was for everyone like their son.

གཟུགས་བརྙན་གྱི་བུད་མེད་ལ་བུད་མེད་དོ་སྙམ་

image, reflection  woman   woman    to think

to think in regard to an image of a woman [that it is] a woman

Topical (ལ་)

དང་པོ་ལ།

first

regarding the first

དང་པོ་རང་ལུགས་བཞག་པ་ལ།

first   own system  to define; to put

firstly, [in regard to] the presentation of our own position

་་་་༌། དེ་ལ་ཡིད་ཆེས་པའི་དད་པ་ནི།

that      trust              faith

in regard to that, the trusting faith:

Adverbial (སུ་རུ་ཏུ་དུ་ར་)

ཁོང་གིས་གསལ་བར་བཤད།

he          clear        explained

He explained clearly.

བདེན་པར་ཡོད་པ

truth          exist

truly existent

མྱུར་དུ་ quick, swift quickly, swiftly

མྱུར་བ་

དེ་ལྟ་བུར་ཡོད་པ་ that like  be to be like that

དེ་ལྟ་བུ་

རྒྱུན་དུ་ continuum continuously

རྒྱུན་

རྟག་ཏུ་ permanent always, constantly, permanently

རྟག་པ་

Qualifier of identity / equivalence (སུ་རུ་ཏུ་དུ་ར་)

For reflections about ambiguities see: "3.2 Note on ambiguities".

མི་དེ་རྣམས་ཆེ་བར་སྣང༌།

human those big to appear

Those people appear as big.

ཁྱིམ་ལ་དུར་ཙམ་དུ་འཛིན།

household grave only  apprehend

to apprehend a household merely as a grave

གཅིག་དུ་མར་སྣང༌།

one    many  appear

one appearing as many

Identity of transformation: what something is transformed into marked by (སུ་རུ་ཏུ་དུ་ར་)

Objective case

མཁས་པར་འགྱུར་བ

learned      to become, change into

to become learned

ལྷ་རུ་གྱུར་

god   became

became a god

དུམ་བུར་གཅོད་པ་

pieces      cut

to cut (something) in to pieces

རྒྱལ་པོས་ནི་སྟ་རེས་མགོ་བོ་དུམ་བུར་གསེས།

king           axe     head    pieces     split, shred

The king split the head into pieces with an axe.

Joining of noun and verb (སུ་རུ་ཏུ་དུ་ར་)

Objective case

These may form new lexicalized² words.

འོད་དུ་འཚེར་བ་

light    to emit, shine, to be bright

to emit light, to be bright

ཉམས་སུ་  ལེན་

experiences to take

to practice

ཉམས་སུ་   མྱོང་བ་

experiences to experience

to experience

² To make or coin a new word or accept a new word into the lexicon of a language.

Verbs with la don

The topic here is the usage of the la don particles directly between a (nominalized) verb or a clause ending in a verb and another verb or adjective. e.g.: བླང་བར་རུང་. This usage quite often expresses an infinitive construction or gerund from an English point of view. (There are different approaches and opinions on how to treat this grammatically.) For the usage between clauses see: "1.11 coordination".

See: "3.1 Note on classifications" and "3.3 Note on omissions".

Direct verb - verb relation (སུ་རུ་ཏུ་དུ་ར་)

Verb and auxiliary verb

རྙེད་པར་འགྱུར།

find    future auxiliary

(one) will find / obtain

རྒྱལ་པོ་བསྲུང་བར་ཡོང༌།

king     protect  future / to come

the king will be protected

ཕྲུ་གུ་སྐྱེས་སུ་ཟིན་ཀྱང་་་

child born  past auxiliary even

even though the child was (already) born, ...

Modal³ relation

See: "3.1 Note on classifications" and "3.2 note on ambiguities" for a further explanation of these relations and the reasons for the coming classifications and their names.

Expressing a quality&mdashepistemic status

མྱུར་དུ་འཆི་བར་ངེས་པས་

soon—————die——————certain

because it is certain [that one] will die soon ...

evaluative status

གཅིག་པུ་འགྲོ་དགོས་

alone—————go————need————(omitted བར་ between the two verbs)

(one) needs to go alone

ཇི་ཙམ་ལེན་ནུས་པ་དེ་ཙམ་བླང་བར་རུང་སྟེ།

as much take able that just take——appropriate

just as much as [one] is able to take on [it] is appropriate to take on

expressing a feature

ཐོས་པར་སྙན་པ་

to hear——pleasant

pleasant to hear

<btr>

་་་འདུལ་བར་སླ་བ་ལ་སེམས་ལྟ་བུ་གཞན་མ་གཟིགས།tame        easier  mind   like other not seen

....in regard to being easy to tame [I] have not seen anything like the mind4

{{{3}}}

ཕྲད་པར་ཤིན་ཏུ་དཀའ།

to meet extremely difficult

extremely difficult to meet

སངས་རྒྱས་ཉག་གཅིག་མ་གཏོགས་གཞན་དག་གིས་ཤིན་ཏུ་རྟོགས་པར་དཀའ་སྟེ།

Buddha       only       except        other       extremely understand difficult

Apart from for the Buddha, for all others [this] is extremely difficult to understand

³ Modality: covering expressions of how the world (situation, circumstances) might be and should be; this includes expressions of necessity, permissibility and probability, and negations of these.

⁴ "(In this world, if tamed and brought onto the path) there is nothing other (that will obey and) is as easy to be tamed like the mind."