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hatāvakāso

hatāvakāsa

masc nom sg of hatāvakāsa (adj)

1. destroyed one's chance; lost the opportunity
2. destroyed the possibility (for rebirth)

Built from

• hata — root · destroyed, struck
  Past participle of √han 'to strike, kill'; cognate with Sanskrit ghna-, Greek phonē (slaughter). Imagery of striking down, eliminating.
• ava — prefix · down, away
  Downward and away motion; works like Latin ab-. Here suggests diminishment or closing of space.
• kāsa — stem · space, room, opportunity
  From √kāś 'to appear, shine'; avakāsa is the space that appears or is left open. Cognate with Sanskrit kāśa.
• hata-avakāsa — root · compound formation
  The attributive compound (bahuvrīhi) describes one whose space/opportunity has been destroyed; nominative singular carries no separate ending mark in this form.

Analysis. hata (destroyed, past participle of han- to strike down) + avakāsa (space, room, opportunity); the compound describes one whose space for continued existence has been destroyed, commonly applied to an arahant who has exhausted the conditions for rebirth.

Etymology. hata from √han (to strike, kill), cognate with Sanskrit ghna-, Greek phonē (slaughter); avakāsa from ava- (down, downward) + √kāś (to appear, shine), so literally 'space that has appeared' or 'room', cognate with Sanskrit avakāśa. The prefix ava- shows downward motion, here implying a narrowing or closing of possibility.

Meanings from the Digital Pāḷi Dictionary; morphology and etymology by Claude.

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