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Theravadin
''Theravāda'' (; 'School of the Elders'; ) is Buddhism's oldest existing school. The school's adherents, termed ''Theravādins'' ( anglicized from Pali ''theravādī''), have preserved their version of the Buddha's teaching or '' Dhamma'' in the Pāli Canon for over two millennia. The Pāli Canon is the most complete Buddhist canon surviving in a classical Indian language, Pāli, which serves as the school's sacred language and ''lingua franca''.Crosby, Kate (2013), ''Theravada Buddhism: Continuity, Diversity, and Identity'', p. 2. In contrast to Mahāyāna and Vajrayāna, Theravāda tends to be conservative in matters of doctrine ('' pariyatti'') and monastic discipline ('' vinaya''). One element of this conservatism is the fact that Theravāda rejects the authenticity of the Mahayana sutras (which appeared onwards). Consequently, Theravāda generally does not recognize the existence of many Buddhas and bodhisattvas believed by the Mahāyāna school, such as Amitābha and ...
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Second Buddhist Council
Since the Mahaparinirvana of the historical Buddha, Siddhartha Gautama, Buddhist monastic communities, the "''sangha''", have periodically convened for doctrinal and disciplinary reasons and to revise and correct the contents of the Buddhist canons. Referred to as Buddhist "councils" (Pāli and Sanskrit: ''saṅgīti'', literally meaning "reciting together" or "joint rehearsal"), the famous First Buddhist Council is recorded in Buddhist texts as being held one year after the Buddha's passing, when Ananda recited all of the spoken sutras, which were recorded in Rajagriha. The two next major Councils were held more than 100 years later. The details of the later councils are debated by modern Buddhist studies. Various sources belonging to different Buddhist schools may contain different accounts of these events. First Buddhist council All six of the surviving Vinaya sources of various early Buddhist schools contain accounts, in whole or in part, of the first and second co ...
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Buddhism
Buddhism, also known as Buddhadharma and Dharmavinaya, is an Indian religion and List of philosophies, philosophical tradition based on Pre-sectarian Buddhism, teachings attributed to the Buddha, a wandering teacher who lived in the 6th or 5th century Before the Common Era, BCE. It is the Major religious groups, world's fourth-largest religion, with about 500 million followers, known as Buddhists, who comprise four percent of the global population. It arose in the eastern Gangetic plain as a movement in the 5th century BCE, and gradually spread throughout much of Asia. Buddhism has subsequently played a major role in Asian culture and spirituality, eventually spreading to Western world, the West in the 20th century. According to tradition, the Buddha instructed his followers in a path of bhavana, development which leads to Enlightenment in Buddhism, awakening and moksha, full liberation from ''Duḥkha, dukkha'' (). He regarded this path as a Middle Way between extremes su ...
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Pāli Canon
The Pāḷi Canon is the standard collection of scriptures in the Theravada Buddhism, Buddhist tradition, as preserved in the Pāli language. It is the most complete extant Early Buddhist texts, early Buddhist canon. It derives mainly from the Tamrashatiya school. According to Buddhist tradition, during the First Buddhist Council, three months after the parinibbana of Gautama Buddha in Rajgir, Ananda recited the Sutta Piṭaka, Sutta Pitaka, and Upali recited the Vinaya Piṭaka, Vinaya Pitaka. The Arhats present accepted the recitations, and henceforth, the teachings were preserved orally by the Sangha. The Tipitaka that was transmitted to Sri Lanka during the reign of King Asoka was initially preserved orally and later written down on palm leaves during the Fourth Buddhist Council in 29 BC, approximately 454 years after the death of Gautama Buddha. The claim that the texts were "spoken by the Buddha" is meant in this non-literal sense. The existence of the Bhāṇaka tradi ...
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Hinayana
Hīnayāna is a Sanskrit term that was at one time applied collectively to the '' Śrāvakayāna'' and '' Pratyekabuddhayāna'' paths of Buddhism. This term appeared around the first or second century. The Hīnayāna is considered as the preliminary or small (''hina'') vehicle (''yana'') of the Buddha's teachings. It is often contrasted with Mahāyāna, the second vehicle of the Buddha's teachings, or the great (''maha'') vehicle (''yana''). The third vehicle of the Buddha's teachings is the Vajrayana, the indestructible (''vajra'') vehicle (''yana''). Western scholars used the term ''Hīnayāna'' to describe the early teachings of Buddhism, as the ''Mahāyāna'' teachings were generally given later. Modern Buddhist scholarship has deprecated the term as pejorative, and instead uses the term ''Nikaya Buddhism'' to refer to early Buddhist schools. ''Hinayana'' has also been inappropriately used as a synonym for Theravada, which is the main tradition of Buddhism in Sri Lanka and S ...
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Vinaya
The Vinaya (Pali and Sanskrit: विनय) refers to numerous monastic rules and ethical precepts for fully ordained monks and nuns of Buddhist Sanghas (community of like-minded ''sramanas''). These sets of ethical rules and guidelines developed over time during the Buddha's life. More broadly, the term also refers to the tradition of Buddhist ethical conduct. The term "Vinaya" also refers to a genre of Buddhist texts which contain these precepts and rules and discuss their application, along with various stories of how the rules arose and how they are to be applied. Various lists and sets of Vinaya precepts were codified and compiled after the Buddha's death in different Vinaya texts.The 17th Karmapa Orgyen Trinley Dorje. "The development of the Vinaya rules for monastics and the Pratimoksha Sutra precepts". August 2022. Transcribed by Adele Tomlin, ''Dakini Translations'', 02 September 2022. As one of the main components of the canonical Buddhist canons (Tripiṭakas), a ...
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Mahāyāna
Mahāyāna ( ; , , ; ) is a term for a broad group of Buddhist traditions, Buddhist texts#Mahāyāna texts, texts, Buddhist philosophy, philosophies, and practices developed in ancient India ( onwards). It is considered one of the three main existing branches of Buddhism, the others being Theravāda and Vajrayāna.Harvey (2013), p. 189. Mahāyāna accepts the main scriptures and teachings of Early Buddhist schools, early Buddhism but also recognizes various doctrines and texts that are not accepted by Theravada Buddhism as original. These include the Mahāyāna sūtras and their emphasis on the ''bodhisattva'' path and Prajnaparamita, ''Prajñāpāramitā''. Vajrayāna or Mantra traditions are a subset of Mahāyāna which makes use of numerous Tantra, tantric methods Vajrayānists consider to help achieve Buddhahood. Mahāyāna also refers to the path of the bodhisattva striving to become a fully awakened Buddha for the benefit of all sentience, sentient beings, and is thus also ...
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Early Buddhist Schools
The early Buddhist schools refers to the History of Buddhism in India, Indian Buddhist "doctrinal schools" or "schools of thought" (Sanskrit: ''vāda'') which arose out of the early unified Buddhist monasticism, Buddhist monastic community (Sangha (Buddhism), saṅgha) due to various schisms in the history of Buddhism, history of Indian Buddhism. The various splits and divisions were caused by differences in interpretations of the Monasticism, monastic rule (Vinaya), doctrinal differences and also due to simple geographical separation as Buddhism spread throughout the Indian subcontinent. The early Buddhist community initially split into two main Nikāyas (monastic groups, divisions), the Sthavira nikāya, Sthavira ("Elders"), and the Mahāsāṃghika ("Great Community"). This initial split occurred either during the reign of Ashoka, Aśoka (c. 268-232 BCE) or shortly after (historians disagree on the matter). Later, these groups became further divided on doctrinal grounds int ...
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Pali
Pāli (, IAST: pāl̤i) is a Classical languages of India, classical Middle Indo-Aryan languages, Middle Indo-Aryan language of the Indian subcontinent. It is widely studied because it is the language of the Buddhist ''Pali Canon, Pāli Canon'' or ''Tripiṭaka, Tipiṭaka'' as well as the sacred language of ''Theravada, Theravāda'' Buddhism. Pali was designated as a Classical languages of India, classical language by the Government of India on 3 October 2024. Origin and development Etymology The word 'Pali' is used as a name for the language of the Theravada canon. The word seems to have its origins in commentarial traditions, wherein the (in the sense of the line of original text quoted) was distinguished from the commentary or vernacular translation that followed it in the manuscript. K. R. Norman suggests that its emergence was based on a misunderstanding of the compound , with being interpreted as the name of a particular language. The name Pali does not appear in t ...
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Richard Gombrich
Richard Francis Gombrich (; born 17 July 1937) is a British Indologist and scholar of Sanskrit, Pāli, and Buddhist studies. He was the Boden Professor of Sanskrit at the University of Oxford from 1976 to 2004. He is currently Founder-President of the Oxford Centre for Buddhist Studies. He is a past president of the Pali Text Society (1994–2002) and general editor emeritus of the Clay Sanskrit Library. Early life and education Gombrich is the only child of classical pianist Ilse Gombrich ( Heller; 1910–2006), and Austrian-British art historian Sir Ernst Gombrich. He studied at St. Paul's School in London from 1950 to 1955 before attending Magdalen College, Oxford, in 1957. He received his B.A. from Oxford in 1961 and his DPhil from the same university in 1970. His doctoral thesis was entitled ''Contemporary Sinhalese Buddhism in its relation to the Pali canon''. He received his M.A. from Harvard University in 1963. Early work Gombrich's first major contribution in the ...
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Pāli
Pāli (, IAST: pāl̤i) is a classical Middle Indo-Aryan language of the Indian subcontinent. It is widely studied because it is the language of the Buddhist ''Pāli Canon'' or '' Tipiṭaka'' as well as the sacred language of '' Theravāda'' Buddhism. Pali was designated as a classical language by the Government of India on 3 October 2024. Origin and development Etymology The word 'Pali' is used as a name for the language of the Theravada canon. The word seems to have its origins in commentarial traditions, wherein the (in the sense of the line of original text quoted) was distinguished from the commentary or vernacular translation that followed it in the manuscript. K. R. Norman suggests that its emergence was based on a misunderstanding of the compound , with being interpreted as the name of a particular language. The name Pali does not appear in the canonical literature, and in commentary literature is sometimes substituted with , meaning a string or lineage. Thi ...
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Tipitaka
There are several Buddhist canons, which refers to the various scriptural collections of Buddhist texts, Buddhist sacred scriptures or the various Buddhist Scriptural canon, scriptural canons. Tipitaka
Encyclopædia Britannica (2015)
Some of these collections are also called ''Tipiṭaka'' () or ''Tripiṭaka'' () , meaning "Triple Basket", a traditional term for the three main divisions of some ancient canons. In ancient India, there were several Buddhist scriptural canons that were organized into three main textual divisions: Vinaya (monastic rule), Sutra (which contains teachings of the Buddha) and Abhidharma (which are more systematic and scholastic works). For example, the Pali Canon, ''Pāli Tipiṭaka'' is composed of the ''Vinaya Pitaka, Vinaya Piṭaka'', the ''Sutta Piṭaka'', and the ''Abhidh ...
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Vajrayāna
''Vajrayāna'' (; 'vajra vehicle'), also known as Mantrayāna ('mantra vehicle'), Guhyamantrayāna ('secret mantra vehicle'), Tantrayāna ('tantra vehicle'), Tantric Buddhism, and Esoteric Buddhism, is a Mahāyāna Buddhist tradition that emphasizes esoteric practices and rituals aimed at rapid spiritual awakening. Emerging between the 5th and 7th centuries CE in medieval India, Vajrayāna incorporates a range of techniques, including the use of mantras (sacred sounds), dhāraṇīs (mnemonic codes), mudrās (symbolic hand gestures), mandalas (spiritual diagrams), and the visualization of deities and Buddhas. These practices are designed to transform ordinary experiences into paths toward enlightenment, often by engaging with aspects of desire and aversion in a ritualized context. A distinctive feature of Vajrayāna is its emphasis on esoteric transmission, where teachings are passed directly from teacher (guru or vajrācārya) to student through initiation ceremonie ...
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