The 'Chinese' Theory: For and Against

[rikforto]

So if I understand, you do not object to the notion that a reader circa 1400 could understand the SBJ in Classical Chinese, and could translate it line by line into a contemporary language for an author who was not literate in any Chinese language, right? So is the issue that the resulting translation would not retain the syllable by syllable structure of the written text, making matches between the Classical Chinese SBJ and the SPS spurious in any likely dictation scenario?

This is the short of it! Emphasizing that this would still be a problem if the person writing the VMS knew Classical Chinese (e.g. were their own Dictator) because it is not generally possible to understand phonetic Classical Chinese in later phonological forms and it must be written in a logography. Solving one problem means dealing with the other