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The Fifth Case – Origin

འབྱུང་སའི་ཁུངས་དང་། བྱུང་བའི་ཆོས་གཉིས་སོ་སོར་འབྱེད་ཅིང་། གང་ནས་བྱུང་བའི་ཡུལ་དང་། གང་ནས་དགར་བའི་དངོས་པོ།
གང་ནས་དབྱེ་མཚམས་འཛིན་ཞིང་སྡུད་པ་བཅས་ཉེ་བར་སྟོན་པའི་རྐྱེན།
Meaning: A particle differentiating the source of origin and originated phenomenon; indicating the place of origin, the thing being distinguished from, and from where boundaries are established and included.

The Fifth Case has two particles: ནས་སྒྲ། and ལས་སྒྲ།.
These are not suffix dependent (despite being in that section of the list of fourteen).

The main usage is to mark the origin or source, i.e. when one phenomenon (འབྱུང་གཞི།) gives rise to or is the source for another (འབྱུང་ཆོས།). Most commonly translated as “from”.

However, this should be understood in the widest sense of these words, since the Fifth Case has a variety of usages:

  1. The Source (འབྱུང་ཁུངས།)
    1. Actual (དངོས།): Substance (རྫས།)
    2. Similar aspect (ཆ་འདྲ་བ།):
      1. Place (ཡུལ།)
      2. Person (གང་ཟག)
      3. Secondary Agent (བྱེད་པ་ཙམ།)
      4. Reason (རྒྱུ་མཚན།)
  2. Isolation (དགར་བ།)
  3. Conjunction (སྡུད་པ།)
  4. Comparison
  5. Connective (མཚམས་སྦྱོར་ལྷག་བཅས།)

The Source (Actual) – Substance (རྫས།)

This is referred to as an actual origin or source (འབྱུང་ཁུངས་དངོས།), i.e. when one thing actually comes from another, for example:

The Source (Similar Aspect) – Place (ཡུལ།)

This is said to merely have a similar usage to the above actual origin or source (འབྱུང་ཁུངས་ཆ་འདྲ་བ།), for example:

Here, as opposed to the Substance usage, the east, the sky, etc., are simply the places of origin and not what created the plane, the thunder, etc..

The Source (Similar Aspect) – Person (གང་ཟག)

This usage applies when the Fifth Case is affixed to people (or their writing) and indicates an action as originating from them as an agent (བྱེད་པ་པོའི་ཚུལ་དུ་འཇུག་པ།), for example:

In most cases, this type of Fifth Case could be replaced by a Third Case with minimal or no difference in meaning because the person (e.g. Potowa etc.) is the source where the speech or writing originated from, it is suitable to use the Fifth Case; similarly, being the source, they would also usually be the agent who spoke or wrote and so could also be marked in the Third Case.

However, the opposite is not true: most Third Cases cannot be replaced by such a Fifth Case; for example: “The sheep ate grass.” (ལུག་གིས་རྩྭ་བཟས།) cannot become ལུག་ནས་རྩྭ་བཟས།.

The Source (Similar Aspect) - Secondary Agent (བྱེད་པ་ཙམ།)

This usage indicates an action originating from a secondary event or mental state etc. (considered the secondary agent), using the particles: ངང་ནས། ཐོག་ནས། སྒོ་ནས། and so forth. For example:

Again in most cases, this type of Fifth Case could be replaced by a Third Case with minimal or no difference in meaning (despite technically becoming a Third Case Reason).

The Source (Similar Aspect) - Reason (རྒྱུ་མཚན)

This is one of the Reason Indicators.

The reason usage is also only indicated with the ལས་སྒྲ། and not the ནས་སྒྲ།, for example:

In most cases, the ལས་སྒྲ། could be substituted for a Third Case Reason particle with minimal or no difference in meaning.

Isolation (དགར་བ།)

The Fifth Case can also be used to indicate one among many or isolating a similar-type (རིགས་མཐུན་དགར་བར་འཇུག་པ།); often using གི་ནང་ནས། གི་ཁྲོད་ནས། གི་དཀྱིལ་ནས། etc., for example:

Moreover, the ལས་སྒྲ། in particular has an additional disjunctive usage that is similar to མ་གཏོགས། when used with negations, for example:

Conjunction (སྡུད་པ།)

This usage is used to indicate the beginning of a range, whether in terms of sequences, occasions or places, and is often paired with the བར། བར་དུ། particles to indicate the end point, for example:

A stronger indicator of a starting point is to use དེ་ནས་བཟུང་ནས། or དེ་ནས་བཟུང་སྟེ།, for example:

Please note, only the first of the two ནས་སྒྲ། in that example indicates this conjunction usage; the second (བཟུང་ནས།) is the continuative usage that will be discussed below.

Comparison

The comparison usage is only indicated with the ལས་སྒྲ། and not the ནས་སྒྲ།, for example:

This same usage will also sometimes be indicated by the བས། and པས། particles, for example: དེ་བས་ཆེ་བ།.
There seems to be no difference in meaning, but should not be mistaken for a Third Case.

Connective (མཚམས་སྦྱོར་ལྷག་བཅས།)

This usage is the only time the Fifth Case (only the ནས་སྒྲ།) will be affixed directly to a verb. In other cases, as with the Ladons and so forth, verbs need to be nominalised. This continuative is used to indicate either a sequence or simultaneity of events, i.e. of the actions indicated by the verbs in the sentence.

For example:

In the first example, the two actions (studying and going) are done in sequence – first one studies and then one goes. This is usually the result when this continuative construction is used with two proper verbs, as opposed to the second example where the first clause creates an adverbial construction. Although ལྷོད་ལྷོད་བྱེད་པ། can be used as a proper verb (i.e. “to relax”), in this case it becomes an adverb for the verb “to study” and as such the two are simultaneous rather than sequential.

This is not to say that that will always be the difference between the sequential and simultaneous usages; two direct verbs can also be simultaneous, for example:

However, also in this latter example the first clause could be said to be an adverbial construction of sorts, thereby creating the simultaneity. Otherwise, it will usually be the context that allows you to distinguish between the two.

The verb the ནས་སྒྲ། is affixed to must be in the past tense and one should be able to substitute the ནས་སྒྲ། for a Continuative Particle (ལྷག་བཅས།) without any discernible change in meaning, for example:

Up a level: The eight cases