Christopher Beckwith has recently devoted two publications concerning the origin of the word for “monastery” in East Asia. The proposed Aramaic origin has met with criticism from two eminent authorities, Laurent Sagart and Alexander Vovin. While the present article is not interested in the debate per se, here renamed the “Beckwith Controversy,” it is important to discuss in more detail Beckwith’s view about the Chinese word si 寺 (monastery), its origin, and its reconstruction. It is concluded that, although very imaginative in its conclusions, Beckwith’s argument is methodologically opaque and, therefore, should be definitely abandoned in favour of more plausible solutions.

中文翻译：

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对中文“修道院”一词的阿拉姆语起源的否定

克里斯托弗·贝克威斯 (Christopher Beckwith) 最近专门撰写了两本关于东亚“修道院”一词起源的出版物。提议的亚拉姆语起源遭到了两位著名权威洛朗·萨加特 (Laurent Sagart) 和亚历山大·沃文 (Alexander Vovin) 的批评。虽然本文对辩论本身不感兴趣，这里更名为“贝克威思之争”，但更详细地讨论贝克威思对中文词寺（寺院）及其起源和重建的看法很重要。结论是，尽管其结论非常富有想象力，但贝克维斯的论点在方法论上是不透明的，因此，绝对应该放弃，转而支持更合理的解决方案。