Bodhi Tree Swaying

I’ve been having my meditation website translated into Chinese by Ruan Yinhua, a Mitra of the FWBO who lives in Beijing. I was curious to know how he was going to translate my name, and after a few revisions he said the following:

I now suggest that your Sanskrit name be translated as “????” (pronounced as “Pooti Poso”). I think, this way it is a very poetic and elegant name in Chinese. While “??” is a transliteration of the Sanskrit word “bodhi”, which means wisdom, it also means the “Bodhi tree (wisdom tree)”. The word “??” (pronounced Poso, “Paksa”) is often used to describe the luxuriant trees swaying and dancing elegantly. I think you can visualize such a scene! “Bodhi trees swaying and dancing elegantly.”

I can see how “flapping” might connect with “swaying” which might connect with the literal sense of my name in Sanskrit (Wings of Enlightenment), which apparently doesn’t render very poetically into Chinese. But I agree with Yinhua that his translation is evocative, and I like it.

* As far as I know you won’t see the Chinese characters in the text of this post unless you have Chinese fonts installed on your computer.

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