Pali Canon

The Pali Canon (English) or Tipiṭaka (Pali) is the scripture collection of Theravada Buddhism. The other forms of Buddhism at the present day group themselves under the heading of Mahayana, which tends to regard the Tipiṭaka as a sort of "Old Testament". Most scholars recognize the Canon as the oldest source for the Buddha's teachings. The English name comes from Pali, its language. The most common name in the tradition is Tipitaka (tipiṭaka), meaning "three baskets", after the commonest arrangement of the Canon (see below).

Origins

According to tradition, the Canon is "The Word of the Buddha" (Buddhavacana), and was compiled by the First Council immediately after the Buddha's death, which it dates around 544 BC. Neither statement is intended literally, the Canon in fact including teachings by followers and accounts of events after the First Council. Being actually said by the historical Buddha is not a necessary requirement for counting as Buddhavacana. Nevertheless, tradition regards most of The Canon as recording the actual words of the Buddha.

Modern scholars are not prepared to accept this postition, for a variety of reasons. The most obvious is that the Canon is not unique. We have most of another canon, that of the Sarvastivada, in Chinese translation, together with greater and lesser amounts of various canons in various languages, along with information from secondary sources about the contents of some. These canons are more or less different from the Pali and each other. Scholars reject as implausible Theravada claims that other schools, deliberately or not, added, subtracted and altered while Theravada preserved the exact original teachings.

On the basis particularly of such comparisons, scholars generally divide the Canon, with some disagreement on detail, into earlier and later halves, assuming shared material likely to be earlier than distinctive.

• earlier: the main body of the Vinaya, the first four nikayas, and some of the poetic books of the Khuddakanikaya (there is some disagreement on which ones)
• later: the Parivara, other books of the Khuddakanikaya, and the Abhidhamma

This division is only rough and ready: "early" texts may include later additions, while "late" texts may include early elements.

However, there remains much disagreement on absolute, as against relative, dates, and on further stratification. Professor Gombrich, for example, holds that most of the content of the first four nikayas goes back to the Buddha himself, though not usually in exact words. He himself admits that very few scholars go so far. He also holds that the Canon was much like its present form by about 250 BC, with perhaps some Khuddakanikaya books as the only substantial later additions. Perhaps at the other extreme within the mainstream point of view is the late Professor Nakamura, who held that only parts of the Suttanipata go back to the Buddha's lifetime, with Buddhism changing substantially by the time the first four nikayas were compiled, and that some of the Canon was at least as late as the 2nd century AD.

A few scholars are outside this mainstream view. Professor Schopen rejects the argument that shared material is likely to be earlier than distinctive, arguing to the contrary that it is likely to result from later harmonization. And Professor Samuel holds that a wide range of teachings, including Mahayana, were generally accepted in early Buddhism, and that it was only some centuries after the Buddha's time that some schools started rejecting some; so that the Canon was created by subtraction rather than addition.

Text

The climate of Theravada countries is not conducive to the survival of manuscripts. Apart from brief quotations in inscriptions, the oldest known manuscript is a two-page fragment from the 8th or 9th century found in Nepal, but most are about a millennium later. Thus the manuscripts available are the result of multiple copying, with the inevitable errors accumulated. This is compounded by transcription between alphabets, as Pali has none of its own, each country generally using its own. This problem is exacerbated by more than one occasion on which some texts were lost in one country and had to be reimported from another. Manuscripts tend to follow different national recensions, though with some interaction. The same applies to the printed editions of the Canon: these have been published in Myanmar, Thailand, Cambodia and Sri Lanka. The Burmese edition is nominally the "official" edition for the whole of the Theravada, having been approved by the sixth ecumenical council of the Theravada, representing all five Theravada countries. The Council, however, was dominated by Burmese monks, and the other countries tend to pay only lip-service to it, though a transcript of its edition was published in Thailand in 2005. Modern scholars try to compare these editions, which is made easier by the existence of electronic versions of some editions.

Canon

Some scholars hold that little or nothing was added to the Canon after it was written down from oral tradition in the last century BC.

A standard list of books in the Canon, based on commentaries usually dated to the 5th century , appears in many authorities. Professor Samuel holds that those commentators were largely responsible for the canonization.

By the 19th century some authorities in Burma were including additional material. The Fifth and Sixth Buddhist Councils included three other books in the Canon, two of which are also in the Sinhalese Buddha Jayanti edition. Some Thai editions omit them. However, inclusion in printed editions is not necessarily the same as canonicity. For example, the original King James Bible of 1611 included the Apocrypha, which the Church of England did not and does not consider canonical. Nevertheless, Professor George D. Bond says of one of these books, the Netti, that it is

Regarded as quasi-canonical by some Theravādins and canonical by other Theravādins, especially in Burma

There is disagreement on whether it is still possible for material to be added to the Canon.

Outline of contents

Arrangement varies, but the following seems commonest.

• Vinayapiṭaka, on monastic discipline
  • Suttavibhaṅga: commentary on Pātimokkha, a basic code of rules for monks and nuns, not itself in the Canon except in so far as embedded here; the commentary includes stories of the occasions for the Buddha's laying down of the rules
  • Khandhaka: futher rules, mainly organizational, arranged topically, with stories and explanations; at the end, this book gives accounts of the first two councils
  • Parivāra: further analysis
• Sutta- or Suttanta-piṭaka, discourses: divided into five nikayas (nikāya). The first four of these are in a fairly uniform style, mainly prose
  • Dīghanikāya: 34 long discourses
  • Majjhimanikāya: 152 medium discourses
  • Saṃyuttanikāya: thousands of short discourses arranged topically in 56 groups (saṃyuttas)
  • Aṅguttaranikāya: thousands of short discourses arranged numerically, from 1s to 11s
  • Khuddakanikāya: a miscellaneous collection of books in prose and/or verse; contents vary between editions, with all the following in the 6th Council edition, the last book omitted from the (Sinhalese) Buddha Jayanti edition, and the last three books omitted from a number of editions published in Thailand and from the Khmer edition
    • Khuddakapāṭha: 9 short texts in prose or verse
    • Dhammapada: popular book of 423 verses in 26 chapters, topically
    • Udāna: "inspired utterances", mostly verse, with introductory narratives
    • Itivuttaka: prose pieces followed by verse paraphrases or supplements
    • Suttanipāta: basically poetry, but sometimes with prose frames
    • Vimānavatthu: verse descriptions of heavenly "mansions" and the karma leading to them
    • Petavatthu: an obverse, sufferings of ghosts and the karma leading to them
    • Theragāthā: verses ascribed to senior monks
    • Therīgāthā: similar for nuns
    • Jātaka: 547 poems understood as referring to previous lives of the Buddha
    • Niddesa: commentary on parts of Suttanipāta, traditionally ascribed to the Buddha's disciple Sāriputta
    • Paṭisambhidāmagga: 30 treatises on various topics, also ascribed to him
    • Apadāna: about 600 poems, mostly in the names of monks or nuns telling how meritorious deeds in past lives led to good karmic results and eventual nirvana
    • Buddhavaṃsa: verse book mainly on previous Buddhas and "our" Buddha's meritorious acts towards them in his past lives
    • Cariyāpiṭaka: more Jātaka-type verse
    • Netti(ppakaraṇa): treatise on methods of interpretation, in the name of the Buddha's disciple Kaccāna
    • Peṭakopadesa: similar and overlapping
    • Milindapañha: dialogue between King Menander of Bactria ( c. 150 BC) and a monk called Nāgasena
• Abhidhammapiṭaka, higher or special teaching, more formal and analytical than the discourses
  • Dhammasaṅgaṇi: enumeration and classifcation of mental and physical phenomena
  • Vibhaṅga: analysis of various topics using, among other things, ideas and material from the previous book
  • Dhātukathā: analysis of interrelations among various ideas, mostly from the previous two books
  • Pugalapaññatti: classifications of persons
  • Kathāvatthu: debates on doctrinal points
  • Yamaka: converse pairs of questions, with answers
  • Paṭṭhāna: analysis of 24 types of cuasal conditionality

Role

In theory, the Canon is the highest authority for the teaching. In practice, its great bulk means few are familiar with it as a whole. Therefore there is a tendency to specialize. The Vinaya Pitaka mentions vinaya and sutta specialists. The Milindapanha mentions specialists in each of the five nikayas. The commentaries mention abhidhamma specialists. In modern times, those wishing to be ordained as monks in Sri Lanka have had to memorize the Dhammapada. In Myanmar one can earn the title Teacher of Religion (Dhammācariya) by passing an examination where the set texts are the first volume of each pitaka.

Like Hinduism, Islam, Judaism and Sikhism, and unlike Christianity and Mahayana Buddhism, Theravada emphasizes the original scriptural language. Study and recitation are usually in Pali. The Canon was composed, or evolved, for the most part orally, and is adapted to that medium, and so to memorization. There are rare cases of monks who know the whole Canon by heart, and many know substantial parts. Even lay people usually know a few short passages.

Comparison

Versions of the Vinaya and most of the Sutta exist in Chinese. These are inherited from other schools of ancient Indian Buddhism and differ somewhat from the Pali versions. Similarly, there is a version of the Vinaya in Tibetan.

Notes

See the /Addendum for a more detailed account of the Canon.