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What is the Tipitaka, and what does the name mean?
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3.2.110 cards
What is the Tipitaka, and what does the name mean?
The Pali Canon — the Theravada scriptures. The name means "three baskets": the Vinaya, Sutta and Abhidhamma Pitakas.
Name the three baskets and what each holds.
Vinaya Pitaka — the monastic rule. Sutta Pitaka — the discourses, containing the Dhammapada. Abhidhamma Pitaka — systematic analysis of mind and experience.
Which text sits in the Sutta Pitaka and is most widely read?
The Dhammapada.
Name the Mahayana scriptures the guide lists.
Prajnaparamita literature including the Diamond Sutra and the Heart Sutra; the Sukhavati Sutras; and the Lotus Sutra, which describes the Pure Lands in which the Buddhas reside.
What authorises the Pali Canon for Theravada Buddhists?
Oral transmission from the Buddha to the five arahants and from them to the monastic order — authority by lineage, not by revelation.
How do Mahayana Buddhists justify a wider canon?
They accept that the arhats recited the Pali Canon, but hold that other scriptures are attributed to the bodhisattvas and that all of them are the words of the Buddha.
What does the guide say about the two Buddhist scriptural languages?
That Pali and Sanskrit represent different interpretations — Pali with Theravada, Sanskrit with Mahayana.
Give five Pali/Sanskrit pairs.
dukkha/duhkha, tanha/trishna, anicca/anitya, anatta/anatman, nibbana/nirvana. Also dhamma/dharma, kamma/karma, arahant/arhat, panna/prajna, bodhisatta/bodhisattva.
Which key terms are spelled the same in both languages?
Samsara, maya, sangha, karuna, sila, bhavana and upaya — the guide notes that where only one word is given, the spelling is the same in both.
What further texts belong to Mahayana and Vajrayana development?
Shastras and agamas for Mahayana; the tantras for Vajrayana.
Topic 3.2 study notes
Full notes & explanations for Sacred texts
World Religions exam skills
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