On The Interrogative Sentences In Mahāsāmghika-vinaya

This paper with corpus from the Chinese translation of Mahāsāmghika-vinaya in the Eastern Jin Dynasty,and with research methods of quantitative and qualitative analysis,diachronic comparison and synchronic comparison,makes an inquiry into the interrogative sentences in this vinaya comprehensively.It consists of seven sections.The first section is "Introduction".In order to find out the research orientation,this part focuses on defining Chinese interrogative sentences and reviewing the research situation of middle Chinese interrogative sentences on the basis of clarifying the corpus value and the current situation of language research of Mahāsāmghika-vinaya.The research methods and principles of corpus using are also clarified.The Chapter One inspects specific interrogations.In view of the eight semantic categories of specific questions,this chapter,on the basis of a comprehensive description,makes an exhaustive statistical analysis of the number of various interrogative pronouns,and reveals their grammatical and pragmatic functions.Meanwhile,the paper researches the origin and evolution of partial interrogative pronouns.The Chapter Two discusses the alternative questions.According to the situation of using of association words,the alternative questions in Mahāsāmghika-vinaya can be classified into ten sentence patterns.What’s more,there is an inherent semantic connection between the former and the latter items of the alternative questions,including Opposites,differences and compatibility.The Chapter Three studies the yes-no interrogative sentences as well as positive/negative interrogative sentences.According to the difference of doubt degree,this chapter divides the yes-no questions into general yes-no question sentences and speculate ones.The marks of the former one are interrogative moods and the latter are modal adverbs.The positive/negative interrogative sentences are mostly consist of the"VP-Neg"Pattern and the"VP-Neg-VP"Pattern,there are also a small amount of’Adv-VP-Neg"Pattern and"VP-Prt-Neg"Pattern.During this historical period,the "Neg"of some positive/negative questions with"VP Bu(不)"pattern started grammaticalizing and part of them transformed into yes-no questions.The Chapter Four explores the features of sentence type marks of the interrogations in Mahāsāmghika-vinaya.It includes Interrogative pronouns,interrogative mood words,correlative words and modal adverbs.The paper studies the general age characteristics and the personality of translated Buddhist scriptures through these marks thoroughly,with the combination of diachronic comparison and synchronic comparison as well as quantitative and qualitative analysis.The Chapter Five explores the features of interrogative patterns of questions in Mahāsāmghika-vinaya.The features of these sentences are mainly reflected in the alternative questions and the positive/negative questions.The four types of sentence patterns and the two types of positive/negative sentences not only embody the characteristics of that historical period but also reveal the linguistic features of the translated sutral.This chapter also pays special attention to the path of the evolution of alternative questions and the source of "VP-Neg-VP".The last section is "Summary".This section summarizes the characteristics on morphology and syntax of the interrogative sentences in Mahāsāmghika-vinaya.It reveals that this vinaya is quite oralized and has a distinct feature of Chinese translated Buddhist scriptures.In addition,the paper points out the shortcoming of this study and expresses the expectation of the research of Chinese translated Buddhist scriptures.