The 'Chinese' Theory: For and Against

[rikforto]

The problem is that there is no such thing as "the SBJ sensu stricto".

This is indeed a problem! That is my point here, and I don't see how we can definitively identify the text if we don't even know what the text is, and I don't see an explanation of how you are overcoming this problem.

Sorry, I don't understand this point.  syllabic languages allow a continuum between mere transliteration of the Chinese text -- one Chinese character to one syllable, which is some approximation in the local phonetics of the Chinese pronunciation -- to a proper free translation, with vocabulary,  word order, grammar, and style of the target language.  IF the SPS is a translation of the SBJ into Vietnamese, Burmese, Tibetan, or whatever, it seems to be closer to the former than to the latter.

For illustrative purposes, here is entry 97 from the middle section:
主治寒濕風痺，黃疸。
I've chosen this because it is short, but it gets the essential point across. Classical Chinese is topic-comment, which means the first part of a clause tells us what is being talked about. The first part of the clause here is "主治", which is probably best translated as "primary indication" or "mainly governs", but if you'll allow a more labored translation that captures the semantics, it means, "As for its main use...". The next for characters, 寒濕風痺, establish the main use, namely "for weather-related arthralgia." (Full disclosure: I am relying entirely on the Chinese Text Project's glosses for the medical terms, why this means exactly this is all beyond my ken.) Another use is then juxtaposed, "for jaundice", 黃疸.

Crucially, you cannot omit "主治", as "寒濕風痺，黃疸," has a different topic. As mentioned, I am a little uncertain about the medical terms, but provided the four characters 寒濕風痺 are still read as a unit, they become the new topic, and jaundice becomes the new comment. Something in the ballpark of, "As for it being weather related arthralgia, it is jaundice." I would also be inclined to analyze a four-character string like that as a clause, but I cannot find a good candidate for a verb among the four. This may be my own shortcomings with the language, but zooming out from the particular example I think I have made my point. "主治" isn't omittable under the hypothesis that the SPS is essentially a Literary Chinese text, a fact which is true irrespective of the reading scheme. It shifts the semantics of the sentence away from use.

Aside from the aforementioned issues with identifying a text when we don't actually know what it is, positing that it exists in translation does not much help with this problem. Languages in the Mainland Southeast Asian Language Area are typically topic-comment, meaning a felicitous translation would naturally include the original topic and the translator would be expected to be sensitive to it. All of the languages you've mentioned are topic-comment---some, albeit, with marking---and the Southern Chinese ones you apparently think are the most likely would be the most inclined to preserve this construction in translation and be rendered illegible by omitting the topic. The observation that translation is not binary doesn't help here either, as compromises with the original would increase, not decrease, my expectation that that the topic is retained in translation. It will emerge momentarily that I find an explanation insufficient to claim definitive identification, but bear in mind as you read that, I also don't think this alternative is a particularly obvious or likely explanation considering the languages in play, and certainly not without further proof to that specific point.

Any explanation for any discrepancy, in this case or in any other claim about the VMS by anyone else, would have to be conjectural... If you demand explanations that are 100% certain, you'd better find yourself another hobby, because you will never get them here...

If you think it is categorically impossible to definitively identify the text, then I suggest you withdraw your claim of a definitive match in the conclusion of your write-up and recognize why that is drawing so much scrutiny. If you believe you have definitively identified the text, it is not enough to give an explanation for why there are substantial problems with the match, you need to give the explanation, and strong reasons to accept that as the definitive reason. (The "100% certain" formulation is yours, but "conjectural" is definitionally well below "definitive", I hope we can all agree!) The missing parts are not small---they are grammatically important and part of the information provided as part of the SBJ tradition. The apparent omissions arise as part of your process for identifying the text, which means an explanation is that they are because of flaws in that process. For the identification to be definitive, we have to be able to reject that explanation, not merely entertain speculation to the contrary. I've long held, despite some misgivings that we've discussed, that it is conceivable definitive proof may emerge for non-European or even Southeast Asian origins of the text. I don't think this is it, and more importantly, I don't yet see you making a definitive argument for it.

新年快乐, by the way!