Edinburgh Research Explorer

Buddhist Scriptures: An Overview

Citation for published version:

Appleton, N 2014, 'Buddhist Scriptures: An Overview', Expository Times, vol. 125, no. 12, pp. 573-582.
https://doi.org/10.1177/0014524614532209

Digital Object Identifier (DOI):

10.1177/0014524614532209

Link:
Link to publication record in Edinburgh Research Explorer

Document Version:
Peer reviewed version

Published In:
Expository Times

Publisher Rights Statement:

©Appleton, Naomi / Buddhist Scriptures: An Overview. In: The Expository Times, Vol. 125, No. 12, 2014, p. 573-
582.

General rights
Copyright for the publications made accessible via the Edinburgh Research Explorer is retained by the author(s)
and / or other copyright owners and it is a condition of accessing these publications that users recognise and
abide by the legal requirements associated with these rights.

Take down policy

The University of Edinburgh has made every reasonable effort to ensure that Edinburgh Research Explorer
content complies with UK legislation. If you believe that the public display of this file breaches copyright please
contact openaccess@ed.ac.uk providing details, and we will remove access to the work immediately and
investigate your claim.

Download date: 04. May. 2025

 Buddhist Scriptures

Naomi Appleton, University of Edinburgh

Abstract

In this article I provide an overview of what scripture means and does in a

Buddhist context. The article has three main parts. First, by way of introduction I
explore the history of Buddhist scripture and a few of the different ways in which
scripture was defined and classified in the early period. In the second section I use
the common division into three ‘baskets’ of scripture (discourses, monastic
discipline and higher teachings) to structure a closer look at some of the main
genres of early Buddhist texts. Finally I examine the role of scripture in Buddhist
life, as a source of teachings, a means of making karmic merit, and a vehicle of great
power.
In the interests of time and space I have chosen to focus largely on the
earliest scriptures of Indian Buddhism. Later compositions and compilations, such
as the many scriptures of Tibetan or East Asian Buddhism, are not considered here.1
Because my focus is on the early Indian scriptures I use mainly Sanskrit (Skt)
terminology, with the Pāli (P.) equivalent noted where relevant.

Keywords: Buddha, Buddhism, canon, sacred text, scripture

Introduction

When the Buddha (Awakened One) started teaching sometime in the fifth
century BCE in northeast India, none of his teachings were written down. Tradition
recalls that after his death, five hundred of his awakened followers assembled
together for a saṃgīti (singing together), which has become known as the ‘first
council’. Senior monks chanted the Buddha’s teachings and committed them to
memory, dividing them up into manageable portions such that sub-groups of monks
and nuns became specialists in particular sections of scripture. At this stage the
teachings were said to have constituted either two categories – sūtra (discourses)
and vinaya (monastic regulations) – or three, with the inclusion of the abhidharma

1
For a good overview of these various canons see Lang 2007.
(higher teachings). It was only several centuries later that these texts began to be
written down.2 From the variety of extant texts, as well as the varying accounts of
the first council (and indeed of subsequent councils), it is clear that this process was
neither so tidy nor so successful as tradition would have us believe.3 In reality
Buddhist scriptures were compiled and redacted over a period of several centuries,
and yet the symbolic value of the first council and the notion of the Buddha’s
authorship remains key for many Buddhists to this day.
The Buddha taught in a Northeast Indian dialect (or possibly a variety of
dialects) related to the classical and – for Hindus – sacred language of Sanskrit. In a
religious and political landscape dominated by Sanskrit, it is important that the
Buddha taught in a vernacular accessible to more than just the educated elite.
However, this vernacular flexibility seems not to have lasted long: while some
groups began to present the Buddha’s teachings in the elite language of Sanskrit,
others tried to reconstruct the actual language that the Buddha spoke and thereby
preserve his exact words. This latter move led to the rise of Pāli, a language that is
claimed to be that spoken by the Buddha, but which has been shown in reality to be
a hybrid and artificial construction. Pāli became the scriptural and liturgical
language of what is known as the Theravāda (Doctrine of the Elders) school of
Buddhism, which is prevalent in Sri Lanka and Southeast Asia. The Theravāda
school is the only one to preserve a full and closed set of scriptures, and it is this
that is often referred to as ‘the Pāli canon’. Some scriptures from rival schools of
Indian Buddhism, preserved in Sanskrit and other Indic languages or in Chinese and
Tibetan translations, are also extant, but many were lost when Buddhism died out
in India in the early centuries of the second millennium. And as Buddhism travelled
into other parts of Asia new texts were composed or ‘discovered’ and given
authority comparable to or even in excess of the earliest sources. Of particular
importance are the many texts associated with the Mahāyāna (Great Vehicle)
tradition that developed in India a few centuries after the time of the Buddha and
became dominant in Central and East Asia.
It is clear even from this brief account that inasmuch as ‘scripture’ might
imply a single fixed body of authoritative texts we must use it with caution in a

2
Theravāda tradition tells us that the Pāli scriptures were written down in the first
century BCE in Sri Lanka, but the source for this date is itself rather late. Textual
fragments from north India do date back to the first century, but they bear little
resemblance to extant scriptures. Most likely the process of writing the scriptures
down was both gradual and geographically diffuse. For a useful discussion see
Berkwitz 2010: 48-51.
3
On the Buddhist councils see Prebish 1974 and Berkwitz 2010: 42-46.
Buddhist context. Buddhism is not a religion of the book, and attempts to see it as
such reveal more about the Protestant backgrounds of its early scholars than about
the Buddhist tradition itself.4 While Buddhist scriptures are now in written form,
the earliest Buddhist texts were originally preserved orally, as was the custom at
the time in South Asia. The majority of extant manuscript sources are from the
eighteenth century onwards, and while recently discovered birch-bark manuscript
fragments from the Gandhāran region of Northwest India may date back as far as
the first century BCE, these differ in significant ways from the scriptures preserved
by living Buddhist traditions. 5 A reference to certain named scriptures in an
inscription from the middle of the third century BCE is difficult to relate to extant
collections at all.6 In addition, monastic texts preserve instructions about what to do
to recreate a text if a portion of it is forgotten.7 And to top it all there is no fixed
body of scriptures that is accepted by all living Buddhist groups, but rather a variety
of textual collections that have shaped – and been shaped by – different Buddhist
lineages and sects. However, that is not to say that Buddhists have had no notion of
scriptural authority, rather that this notion was fluid and open to multiple
interpretations.
Perhaps the most important Buddhist term that might equate to the notion
of scripture is buddhavacana, literally the ‘word of the Buddha’. Everything that the
Buddha said is revered as having great value, and all buddhavacana could therefore
be considered scripture. A text did not have to be spoken by the Buddha himself to
be designated authoritative, however. As various scriptures put it, just as whatever
the Buddha speaks is well spoken, so also whatever is well spoken is the word of the
Buddha.8 Since the eternal truth that was realised and communicated by the Buddha
– known as the dharma (Skt), or dhamma (P) – is also accessible to others, the
emphasis is not upon teachings originating with the Buddha but rather upon

4
The effort early scholars of Indian religions made to seek the ‘true’ religion in the
form of scripture and the effect this had on the development of modern Buddhism
has been well documented in recent decades. For a pithy and influential argument
for rebalancing our use of sources see Schopen 1991.
5
For an overview of these sources see Salomon 1999, and for a discussion of how
they affect the scholarly approach to text and canon see Salomon 2006.
6
This is the Calcutta-Bairat minor rock edict, one of many inscriptions from the
reign of the Emperor Aśoka, who is believed to have been a significant patron of
Buddhism. See Hultzsch 1991: 172-4.
7
See Schopen 1997.
8
For example see the conversation between the monk Uttara and the king of the
gods Sakka in Aṅguttara Nikāya 8.8, Bodhi (trans.) 2012: 1120.
teachings that are compatible with the dharma. Hence the Buddha is believed to
have declared that any teaching – whether heard from himself or from his senior
monks – can be checked against the sūtras (discourses) and vinaya (monastic
discipline) and declared to be buddhavacana if it is in accordance with them.9 Of
course in terms of the establishing of a scriptural corpus this is somewhat circular,
as it relies upon an existing body of authoritative scriptures against which any
newcomers must be tested. Nonetheless the principal would appear to be that
scriptural authority comes from identification with the dharma rather than with the
exact words of the Buddha. This fairly fluid and open definition of scripture
inevitably helped the creation of a wide variety of texts and textual collections of
varying types.
An early classification of Buddhist scripture is into the Tripiṭaka, or ‘three
baskets’ of sūtra (discourses), vinaya (monastic discipline) and the somewhat later
abhidharma (higher teachings). The antiquity of the first two of these ‘baskets’ is
well established, since we not only have a full set of texts in the Pāli canon, but also
several parallel texts from different schools of early Buddhism, largely preserved in
Chinese translations. We can therefore see that a lot of the core teachings and
monastic regulations – though not always down to the details – were shared across
schools and must have been compiled before the various divisions in the Buddhist
community that began to occur within a century or so of the Buddha’s death.10 The
abhidharma tradition, which classified the dharma into a systematic account, varied
significantly between the different Buddhist schools and is clearly a later scholastic
tradition.
Another early classification of Buddhist scripture is into nine ‘limbs’ (aṅgas),
which can be understood as genres or types of scripture. Top of the list is the sūtra
or discourse, a teaching of the Buddha given to a particular audience. Usually these
are preserved in the form of a dialogue, and so the Buddha’s teaching is embedded
into a story of where, when, why and to whom the teaching was given. Other
textual forms fill up the list: mixed prose and verse (geya), verse alone (gāthā),
ecstatic utterances (udāna), quotations (ityuktaka, literally ‘thus-saids’), explanations
(vyākaraṇa) and expansions (vaipulya). In addition, two explicitly narrative
categories are included: stories of ‘wonders’ (adbhūta), understood to refer primarily
to events in the Buddha’s lifestory, and ‘birth stories’ (jātaka), which are tales of the

9
For example the Mahāparinibbāna Sutta of the Dīgha Nikāya. Walshe (trans.) 1995:
255-6.
10
For an overview of the history of Buddhist schools see Berkwitz 2010: 51-67.
past lives of the Buddha.11 The inclusion of these latter categories highlights the
important role of narrative – particularly stories relating to the Buddha’s past and
final lives – in Buddhist teaching. In practical terms all of these genres were
preserved within the ‘basket’ of the sūtras.
While explorations of genre played their part, it is the division into three
baskets that appears to have the most currency in Buddhist communities both past
and present. The Pāli scriptures of the Theravāda school are still classified
according to this division, and evidence suggests that other schools of early Indian
Buddhism also arranged their scriptures in a similar manner. Even when new texts
were circulating amongst the Mahāyāna movement many were explicitly classified
as sūtras in order to give them the authenticity of being buddhavacana. Thus, having
taken a broad look at the concept of scripture in Buddhism and the history of its
composition and preservation, I would now like to focus on this division into three
baskets. This threefold division will allow us to take a closer look at what early
Buddhists – and Theravāda Buddhists to this day – consider to be the most
important scriptures.

The Three Baskets of Scripture

The Buddha’s Discourses

According to the Pāli scriptures, the ‘Basket of Discourses’ (P. Sutta-pitaka)

contains five divisions, or Nikāyas: (1) Dīgha Nikāya, or ‘long’ discourses; (2) Majjhima
Nikāya, or ‘middle-length’ discourses; (3) Aṅguttara Nikāya, or discourses that are
‘numeric’ in their arrangement; (4) Saṃyutta Nikāya, or discourses ‘connected’ by
theme; and (5) Khuddaka Nikāya, the ‘minor’ or miscellaneous collection. Parallel
collections to the first four of these texts are also found in the scriptures of other
schools, and they are considered some of the oldest Buddhist texts. Their manner of
collection – by length, connection, or ascending number of concepts – harks back to
their oral heritage and the need for mnemonic devices. The Dīgha and Majjhima are
particularly good introductions to the early Buddhist teachings, and their contents
are presented largely in the form of prose dialogues between the Buddha and a
variety of followers, challengers and patrons. In these texts we find all the main
doctrines of early Buddhism: the impermanence and suffering inherent in all

11
The terms are quoted in Sanskrit. The standard Pāli listing is more or less
identical: sutta, geyya, veyyākaraṇa, gāthā, udāna, itivuttaka, jātaka, abbhutadhamma,
vedalla. A division into twelve limbs developed later and largely superceeded the
ninefold classification.
existence, the affects of karma on one’s rebirth and experiences, the need to control
one’s attachments and discipline the mind. We also find various attempts to refute
the teachings of rival schools, as well as some of the earliest biographical sources
for the Buddha’s life and an account of past Buddhas of earlier ages.
The fifth Nikāya of the Pāli canon, though termed ‘minor’ or ‘little’, is
actually far longer than any of the other Nikāyas. It contains fifteen discrete texts,
some of which are understood to be the earliest extant texts of Indian Buddhism,
and others of which are probably the latest to have been accepted as canonical. The
Dhammapada, a collection of 423 verses summarizing the core teachings of
Buddhism, is notable not only for its antiquity but also for being the most
frequently translated Buddhist text. Complementing the simplicity and elegance of
the Dhammapada verses, a long tradition of narrative commentary has developed,
with many stories of people’s past lives or adventures told to explain the occasion
on which each verse was spoken by the Buddha.12
Another key text belonging to the Khuddaka Nikāya is the Jātaka, though
traditionally only the – often enigmatic – verses of that text belong to the Nikāya,
with the accompanying prose narrative being officially designated as commentary.13
The Jātaka collection comprises around 550 stories of episodes in the past lives of
the Buddha. Many are simple animal stories (the animal realm being included in the
rebirth possibilities of Buddhism), while others are longer more dramatic pieces
concerning complex human dilemmas. To give two examples at opposite ends of the
spectrum, a popular story cycle tells of the Buddha-to-be’s life as a wily monkey,
who manages to outwit the attempts of a crocodile to kill and eat him. Another tells
of the Buddha-to-be’s birth as the wise man Mahosadha, and his ability to solve
complex riddles and problems, including determining the rightful mother of a child,
in a parallel story to that of King Solomon’s judgement. Indeed, many stories of the
Jātaka collection have parallels in other texts both within and outside India. Over
time the stories became understood as illustrating the gradual path to buddhahood,
and the qualities – such as generosity, wisdom and honesty – that had to be
developed by the Buddha-to-be. A long biographical preface known as the Nidāna-

12
Roebuck’s excellent 2010 translation of the Dhammapada for Penguin Classics
contains a summary of the commentarial stories in an appendix.
13
For a selection of stories from the Pāli Jātaka book see Shaw (trans.) 2006, and for a
study that places Jātaka texts and stories into the context of the wider ideological
history of Theravāda Buddhism see Appleton 2010. Jātaka stories were also popular
outside of Theravāda Buddhism, as is evidenced by their inclusion in the list of nine
‘limbs’ of the teaching outlined above. For a delightful example from Sanskrit
literature see Khoroche (trans.) 1989.
kathā (Story of the Beginnings) is probably the earliest full chronological outline of
the Buddha’s lifestory, though its dating is uncertain.14
The five Nikāyas were the subject of an extensive commentarial tradition,
and this came to its height in around the fifth century CE with the work of an Indian
Buddhist monk named Buddhaghosa. Buddhaghosa travelled to Sri Lanka in order to
study the Pāli scriptures, and he stayed for many years studying both the core texts
and the various Sinhalese commentaries that had been written on them. After
proving his mettle with an outstanding treatise entitled the Visuddhimagga (Path of
Purification), he set to work compiling Pāli commentaries that would become
authoritative for Theravāda Buddhists throughout South and Southeast Asia. The
commentaries – or aṭṭhakathā, literally ‘saying what it means’ – took various forms,
explaining philological issues or matters of interpretation, presenting any
competing understandings of a given issue (before ruling on his preferred
interpretation) or providing extra narrative explanation. Most of the commentaries
on the Nikāyas, as well as on the Vinaya and Abhidhamma, are attributed to
Buddhaghosa, though some of these – including the copious Jātaka book – are almost
certainly not his work. Other commentators took up the texts leftover by this great
scholar – who was understood by some to be a future Buddha – and in due course
other layers of commentary were composed as well.
While the contents of the Nikāyas – and especially the Khuddaka Nikāya – vary
considerably in style, the notion that they are sūtra (Skt) or sutta (P.) is key to their
position as scripture. Within a couple of centuries of the Buddha’s death, adherents
of the new ideology of the Mahāyāna (Great Vehicle) were circulating their own
sūtras that communicated the philosophical teachings of emptiness, the core ideals
of wisdom and compassion, and the way all beings should proceed on the bodhisattva
path, or the path to complete buddhahood. These sūtras differ in style to those of
the Pāli scriptures and their early Indian parallels, yet they adopt the same genre
term presumably in order to add legitimacy to a body of texts believed to have been
hidden by the Buddha ready for later revelation.15

14
Jayawickrama’s 1990 translation therefore makes an excellent (and relatively
concise) introduction to the lifestory of the Buddha, including his long career of
past lives. The Mahāvastu (Great Story) forms a much longer text of somewhat
parallel genre and similar period of composition, from within the Mahāsāṅghika
school of Indian Buddhism; see Jones (trans.) 1949-56.
15
Mahāyāna Buddhists did not only produce sūtras, of course. Other genres of text
also circulated, including a large body of philosophical works, and texts outlining
the requirements of the bodhisattva path. For an excellent translation of the
Mūlamadhyamakakārikā, one of the most prominent Mahāyāna philosophical texts,
Monastic Discipline (Vinaya)

Early Buddhism was a monastic order, originally based around the idea that
ordained men and women would wander in small groups, staying only a short time
in any one place, except during the rainy season when travel became difficult.
Gradually, with increased lay support, including significant land donations from
wealthy patrons, monasticism became more settled and institutionalized.
Nonetheless the ritual calendar for ordained Buddhists continued to revolve around
the notion of the rainy-season retreat, the beginning and end of which were marked
by ceremony. Other key rituals included the ordination of new entrants to the
order, and a fortnightly recitation of the monastic regulations to re-purify the
community; any transgressions of the rules were confessed at this event, and the
appropriate sanctions imposed. All these rituals, and in particular the more than
two hundred regulations that guided monastic life, were preserved in the Basket of
the Vinaya (Discipline).
The Vinaya code, consisting both of monastic regulations and rituals, and of
the stories behind their composition and preservation (including our earliest
accounts of the Buddhist councils) is preserved in several extant versions. The
Theravāda Vinaya is still in use in Sri Lanka and Southeast Asia, where the
traditional division into monastic and lay Buddhist adherents is maintained.
Although many branches of Mahāyāna Buddhism have rejected the traditional
monastic path, the Vinaya text of the Mūlasarvāstivādins is authoritative in Tibet,
and that of the Dharmaguptakas is preserved in Chinese translation. The variety of
extant Vinaya texts thus provide crucial insight into lineages of early Indian
Buddhism whose early sūtra texts are only partially preserved and no longer
authoritative for any living Buddhist community.
The rules contained in the Vinaya are divided into categories in descending
order of severity. The first four rules, if broken by a monk, lead to permanent
expulsion from the order; these rules prohibit sexual intercourse, theft, murder,
and falsely boasting of spiritual attainments.16 Lesser categories of offence require a

see Siderits and Katsura (trans.) 2013, and for a good example of a text exploring the
bodhisattva path see Crosby and Skilton (trans.) 1995. Whether or not such texts
count as ‘scripture’ is open to debate, especially given that both have named
authors, but their influence over Buddhist communities is undeniable.
16
Nuns have eight offences that lead to expulsion – the same four as the monks, and
extras that prohibit physical contact with a man (in two rules), failing to report the
expellable faults of a fellow nun, and following an expelled monk. The stories
meeting of the community, confession or training. These regulations cover
everything from how to deal with monks who exhibit lustful behavior, to what
possessions are permissible and how they should be apportioned, to what
constitutes an appropriate place to go to the toilet. Many rules cover areas related
to the Buddhist path, which requires pure morality and a clear mind for meditation,
while many others are matters of ascetic decorum designed to ensure the smooth
running of the monastic community. It was differences in the detail of these rules
that led to divisions in the early Buddhist community, since a person is ordained
into a particular Vinaya code.

The ‘Higher Teaching’ (Abhidharma)

In addition to divisions according to different interpretations of the Vinaya,

another key divide between the different early Buddhist schools concerned their
Abhidharma tradition, and here the variations were more significant. The
Abhidharma, which makes up the third ‘basket’, is a scholastic attempt to classify the
Buddhist teachings and understand the nature of reality. Several Abhidharma (P.
Abhidhamma) traditions are known of, most notably those of the Theravāda school
and that of the Sarvāstivādins. Sarvāstivāda means ‘the doctrine that everything
exists’ and refers to that school’s understanding of the momentary existence of all
aspects of reality (called dharmas or dhammas). This is in contrast to the Theravāda
understanding that all aspects of reality are empty of inherent existence. This
fundamental difference of understanding is just part of a broader set of differences
that demonstrate the divergence of Indian Buddhist schools prior to the
composition of the Abhidharma texts.
The Theravāda Abhidhamma is divided into seven sections, each of which
takes a slightly different approach to the philosophical and psychological analysis of
existence. Given its length and complexity, it is notable that it is not restricted to
deep study by Buddhist scholars, but also holds ritual significance as symbolic of the
Buddha’s teachings as a whole. Two summaries of the collection are commonly
used. One is the mātikā (‘matrix’) that is found in the opening book of the
Abhidhamma, the Dhammasaṅganī. This matrix classifies reality into twenty-two
triads and one hundred dyads, and so the totality of existence is summarized in a
single chant. Another method of abbreviating the Abhidhamma is through including
only the openings of each of the seven books, thus in a way evoking the entire

surrounding the creation and maintenance of the nuns’ order are complicated and
paint an ambivalent picture of women’s position within early Buddhism. Berkwitz
2010: 38-42 provides a helpful summary.
collection and the entirety of reality. Chants based on the Abhidhamma play an
important part in rituals in the Theravāda world, perhaps especially during
funerary rites.

Scripture in Buddhist Practice

We have now surveyed the main scriptures of early Buddhism, including the
full canon of the Theravāda school. It is perhaps only in this latter school that the
notion of canon as a closed set of authoritative scriptures makes sense. A shared
acceptance of the Pāli Nikāyas, Vinaya and Abhidhamma binds together the rather
diverse lived traditions of Sri Lanka and Southeast Asia. The commentaries of
Buddhaghosa, his treatise the Visuddhimagga, and the extensive narrative
commentaries such as the Jātaka book also form part of the shared scriptural
heritage of Theravāda Buddhists. And while we may not have a full set of scriptures
for any of the other schools of early Indian Buddhism, the extant texts demonstrate
that the division into three baskets – with supplementary commentaries, treatises,
and narrative collections – seems to have applied across the board. With the
development of the Mahāyāna and the circulation of alternative scriptures, and
with the gradual loss of Buddhism in its homeland, these early scriptures fell into
obscurity.
Although the Pāli canon is authoritative for all Theravāda Buddhists, there is
– as several scholars have noted – a disparity between what is listed as forming a
part of the scriptural canon, and what others have called the ‘practical canons’ of
Buddhist communities.17 Prior to modern attempts to edit and translate the full
canonical works, monastic libraries seem to have contained more vernacular,
narrative or ritual texts, chanting manuals and compilations. Scriptural study
remains an important part of monastic life, but a certain emphasis is placed on
those scriptures most immediately present in the obligations of the monk, in
particular the Prātimokṣa of the Vinaya (which is chanted every fortnight), chanting
texts that are used at rituals such as funerals or merit-making ceremonies, and
sermons, often with a high narrative content. While Theravāda Buddhists may nod
to the authority of the Dīgha Nikāya or Abhidhamma texts, they are more likely to be
familiar with Jātaka stories or ritual abbreviations of the Abhidhamma.
An important ceremony amongst Theravāda Buddhists is the paritta or
‘protective’ ritual. In it, monks chant selected scriptures for their protective power.

17
See Blackburn 2001 and McDaniel 2008 for two studies of Theravāda scriptural
engagement, including discussion of ‘practical canon’ as a concept in the study of
Buddhism.
The ritual relies upon the bringing together of the three ‘jewels’ or ‘refuges’ of
Buddhism: the Buddha, the dhamma and the community of monks. While the monks
chant the dhamma the Buddha is usually present in the form of an image, and all
three jewels are linked by a sacred thread that is later divided and tied around the
wrists of those present. Paritta ceremonies are carried out to bring benefits to all
sorts of occasions, including birthdays, the building of a new house, or the
beginnings and endings of rains retreats. They are also conducted in times of famine
or disease, or at funerals. The texts included in the paritta are short extracts from
the Nikāyas and Vinaya, but their assembly into a new textual collection for ritual
use illustrates both the perceived potency of scripture and the flexibility in its
arrangement and classification.
As well as the use of scriptural texts in various day-to-day practices, it is
clear that the study and preservation of scripture is considered a highly meritorious
activity, that is to say it brings good karmic merit that will result in pleasant future
experiences. While gaining a better understanding of the Buddha’s teachings
through the study of scripture also has clear benefits, preserving and venerating
scripture in the form of text is not always related to reading or understanding it.
Scribal colophons indicate that great merit was believed to accrue from making a
copy of a text. Often the scribe declares his intention that this merit be shared with
deceased family members. Alternatively, or additionally, the scribe declares his
hope that the merit will enable him to be reborn at the time of a future Buddha;
rebirth at such a time is considered hugely advantageous in that it allows one to
hear the teachings directly from a living Buddha.
While a certain veneration for scriptures in their physical form is present in
Theravāda society, a more developed cult of the book appears to have been a part of
Indian Mahāyāna tradition. Early Mahāyāna sūtras contain long passages extolling
the great benefits of copying the text or enshrining it, or making offerings to it. The
symbolic value of the text as dharma (teaching, Truth) in some cases appears to have
taken on more significance than an ability to understand its contents. Seeing the
text, like seeing the Buddha, was believed to be incredibly potent in its ability to help
a being towards enlightenment. Huge collections of manuscripts in Nepal, many of
which are poorly copied and incorporate scribal errors, indicate that the injunction
to copy a text for merit was taken seriously by those unable to understand the
meaning of the text itself.
The idea that texts are symbolically important is linked to their
identification as the ‘dharma-body’ of the Buddha, that is to say a part of him living
on alongside remnants of his physical body in the form of relics and images. These
two forms of the Buddha’s ‘body’ are often found paired together, for example when
manuscripts are placed inside hollow Buddha images, or enshrined in reliquaries.
Through these combinations of potent leftovers from the Buddha’s lifetime his
presence – along with all its protective and instructive power - is invoked. While
understanding the content of the text may, in such cases, be secondary, it is still
important that the text is understood to contain the dharma, the true teaching of
the Buddha. A parallel can thus be drawn with other ritual uses of scripture, for
example paritta chanting, in which the audience may not understand the contents
of what is being said, but they do trust that the words are buddhavacana and embody
the dharma.
As Mahāyāna Buddhism spread east new scriptures took on particular
potency. In particular the Lotus Sūtra became central to some movements that
advocated chanting as a tool for salvation. In forms of Pure Land Buddhism,
adherents use various practices including visualization and chanting in order to
gain rebirth in a ‘pure land’, which is a special realm created by a celestial Buddha.
Rebirth in a pure land is a reasonable guarantee of the eventual achievement of
awakening, for once there a Buddhist is exposed to the teachings of the resident
Buddha until he is ready to attain nirvana. While there are several groups with
different methods for attaining this realm, Nichiren Buddhism, a form that emerged
in Japan in the thirteenth century, relies upon chanting a homage to the Lotus Sūtra,
which is believed to contain a extraordinary form of sacrality and power.18 Once
again we see a Buddhist movement using scripture in its practice, with an
understanding that scripture is the source of great potency.
These few examples demonstrate the multiple ways in which scripture plays
a part in Buddhist practice. While scholars have tended to be primarily concerned
with the contents of the texts, and in particular with the contents of explicitly
doctrinal and philosophical texts, in reality scripture is much more than this.
Although there is great respect for the words of the Buddha amongst Buddhists, and
although the Theravāda school preserves a closed canon of texts that remains
authoritative for South and Southeast Asian Buddhists to this day, studying the
contents of texts is only one of many ways in which Buddhists interact with their
scripture. As well as communicating the teachings of the Buddha or the reality of
the dharma, texts can also have symbolic importance and sacred power precisely
because they are understood to contain the Truth. In addition, what Buddhists
actually read or hear in order to access the dharma is often not ‘scripture’ in the
strictest sense but rather sermons, stories or ritual chants, or later texts that
provide a philosophical or systematic account of the Buddhist teachings. Just as in
any other religion, scripture has a complex and multi-faceted place within the
Buddhist tradition.

18
See Swanson 2007.
Bibliography

Buddhist scriptures in translation

Bodhi, Bhikkhu (trans.) 1995. In the Buddha’s Words: An Anthology of Discourses from the
Pāli Canon. Somerville MA: Wisdom Publications.
Bodhi, Bhikkhu (trans.) 2000. The Connected Discourses of the Buddha: a Translation of
the Saṃyutta Nikāya. Boston: Wisdom Publications.
Bodhi, Bhikkhu (trans.) 2012. The Numerical Discourses of the Buddha: a Translation of
the Aṅguttara Nikāya. Bristol: The Pali Text Society, in association with
Wisdom Publications.
Crosby, Kate and Andrew Skilton (trans.) 1995. Śāntideva: The Bodhicaryāvatāra.
Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press.
Gethin, Rupert (trans.) 2008. Sayings of the Buddha. Oxford World’s Classics. Oxford:
Oxford University Press.
Horner, I. B. (trans.) 1938–66. The Book of the Discipline. London: The Pali Text Society.
Jayawickrama, N. A. (trans.) 1990. The Story of Gotama Buddha: The Nidāna-kathā of the
Jātakaṭṭhakathā. Oxford: The Pali Text Society.
Jones, J. J. (trans.) 1949–56. The Mahāvastu. 3 vols. London: Luzac and Co.
Khoroche, Peter (trans.) 1989. Once the Buddha was a Monkey: Ārya Śūra’s Jātakamālā.
University of Chicago Press.
Ñāṇamoli, Bhikkhu (trans.) 1991. The Path of Purification (Visuddhimagga) by
Bhadantācariya Buddhaghosa. 5th edn. Kandy: Buddhist Publication Society.
Ñāṇamoli, Bhikkhu, and Bhikkhu Bodhi (trans.) 2009. The Middle Length Discourses of
the Buddha: a Translation of the Majjhima Nikāya. 3rd edn. Somerville MA:
Wisdom Publications.
Roebuck, Valerie J. (trans.). 2010. The Dhammapada. London: Penguin Classics.
Shaw, Sarah (trans.) 2006. The Jātakas: Birth Stories of the Bodhisatta. New Delhi:
Penguin.
Siderits, Mark, and Shōryā Katsura (trans.) 2013. Nāgārjuna’s Middle Way:
Mūlamadhyamakakārikā. Somerville MA: Wisdom Publications.
Walshe, Maurice (trans.) 1995. The Long Discourses of the Buddha: a Translation of the
Dīgha Nikāya. Boston: Wisdom Publications.
Watson, Burton (trans.) 1993. The Lotus Sutra. New York: Columbia University Press.

Internet sources:
www.accesstoinsight.org contains a wealth of translations of Pāli scriptures as well
as useful background material.
www.sacred-texts.com/bud/index.htm contains full text reproduction of out-of-
copyright translations of key Buddhist texts from a range of traditions.

Secondary sources
Appleton, Naomi. 2010. Jātaka Stories in Theravāda Buddhism. Farnham: Ashgate.
Collins, Steven. 1992. ‘On the Very Idea of the Pāli Canon’, Journal of the Pali Text
Society 35: 89-126.
Berkwitz, Stephen C. 2010. South Asian Buddhism: A Survey. London & New York:
Routledge.
Blackburn, Anne M. 2001. Buddhist Learning and Textual Practice in Eighteenth-Century
Lankan Monastic Culture. Princeton NJ: Princeton University Press.
Hultsch, E. 1991. Inscriptions of Aśoka. New Delhi: Archaeological Survey of India.
Keown, Damien and Charles S. Prebish (eds) 2007. Encyclopedia of Buddhism.
Abingdon: Routledge.
Lang, Karen. 2007. Contributions to Keown and Prebish (ed) Encyclopedia of Buddhism:
‘Canons and Literature’ (195-205); ‘Tripiṭaka, Chinese’ (757-760); ‘Tripiṭaka,
Sanskrit and Prakrit’ (760-63); ‘Tripiṭaka, Tibetan’ (763-5).
McDaniel, Justin Thomas. 2008. Gathering Leaves and Lifting Words: Histories of Buddhist
Monastic Education in Laos and Thailand. Seattle WA: University of Washington
Press.
Prebish, Charles S. 1974. ‘A Review of Scholarship on the Buddhist Councils’, Journal
of Asian Studies 33 239-54.
Salomon, R. 1999. Ancient Buddhist Scrolls from Gandhāra: The British Library Kharoṣṭhī
Fragments. Seattle WA: University of Washington Press.
Salomon, R. 2006. ‘Recent Discoveries of Early Buddhist Manuscripts and their
Implications for the History of Buddhist Texts and Canons,’ in P. Olivelle
(ed.) Between the Empires: Society in India 300 BCE to 400 CE: 349-82. New York:
Oxford University Press.
Schopen, Gregory. 1991. ‘Archaeology and Protestant Suppositions in the Study of
Indian Buddhism’, History of Religions 31: 1-23.
Schopen, Gregory. 1997. ‘If You Can’t Remember, How to Make It Up: Some Monastic
Rules for Redacting Canonical Texts’, in P. Kieffer-Pülz and Jens-Uwe
Hartmann (eds) Bauddhavidyāsudhākaraḥ: Studies in Honour of Heinz Bechert on
the Occasion of his 65th Birthday: 571-82. Swisttal-Odendorf.
Swanson, Paul L. 2007 ‘Nichiren and Nichirenshū’ in Keown and Prebish (ed)
Encyclopedia of Buddhism: 547-9.