World Religion: An overview of the Buddhist scriptures

Is there a Buddhist Bible? Not exactly. Buddhism has a large number of scriptures, but few texts are accepted as authentic and authoritative by any school of Buddhism.

There is another reason why there is no Buddhist Bible. Many religions regard their scriptures as the revealed word of God or gods. In Buddhism, however, it is understood that the scriptures are teachings of the historical Buddha - who was not a god - or other enlightened masters.

The teachings of the Buddhist scriptures are indications for practice or how to achieve enlightenment for oneself. The important thing is to understand and put into practice what the texts teach, not just "believe it".

Types of Buddhist scriptures
Many scriptures are called "sutra" in Sanskrit or "sutta" in pali. The word sutra or sutta means "thread". The word "sutra" in the title of a text indicates that the work is a sermon from the Buddha or one of his main disciples. However, as we will explain later, many sutras probably have other origins.

The sutras are available in many sizes. Some are long, others only a few lines. No one seems willing to guess how many sutras there would be if you massed all individuals of each canon and collected in a pile. A lot.

Not all scriptures are sutras. In addition to the sutras, there are also comments, rules for monks and nuns, fairy tales about the life of the Buddha and many other types of texts also considered "scriptures".

Canons of Theravada and Mahayana
About two millennia ago, Buddhism split into two large schools, called Theravada and Mahayana today. Buddhist scriptures are associated with one or the other, divided into Theravada and Mahayana canons.

The teravadines do not consider Mahayana scriptures authentic. The Mahayana Buddhists, on the whole, consider the Theravada canon authentic, but in some cases the Mahayana Buddhists think that some of their scriptures have replaced the authority of the Theravada canon. Or, they are switching to different versions than the Theravada version.

Buddhist scriptures Theravada
The writings of the Theravada school are collected in a work called Pali Tipitaka or Pali Canon. The word pali Tipitaka means "three baskets", which indicates that the Tipitaka is divided into three parts, and each part is a collection of works. The three sections are the sutra basket (Sutta-pitaka), the discipline basket (Vinaya-pitaka) and the special teachings basket (Abhidhamma-pitaka).

Sutta-pitaka and Vinaya-pitaka are the recorded sermons of the historical Buddha and the rules he established for monastic orders. Abhidhamma-pitaka is a work of analysis and philosophy attributed to the Buddha but was probably written a couple of centuries after his Parinirvana.

The Theravadin Pali Tipitika are all in the Pali language. There are versions of these same texts also recorded in Sanskrit, although most of what we have of them are Chinese translations of lost Sanskrit originals. These Sanskrit / Chinese texts are part of the Chinese and Tibetan canons of Mahayana Buddhism.

Mahayana Buddhist scriptures
Yes, to add confusion, there are two canons of the Mahayana scriptures, called the Tibetan canon and the Chinese canon. There are many texts that appear in both canons and many that don't. Tibetan Canon is obviously associated with Tibetan Buddhism. The Chinese Canon is most authoritative in East Asia - China, Korea, Japan, Vietnam.

There is a Sanskrit / Chinese version of the Sutta-pitaka called Agamas. These are found in the Chinese Canon. There are also many Mahayana sutras that have no counterparts in Theravada. There are myths and stories that associate these Mahayana sutras with the historical Buddha, but historians tell us that the works were mostly written between the 1st century BC and the XNUMXth century BC, and some even later. For the most part, the provenance and authorship of these texts are unknown.

The mysterious origins of these works raise questions about their authority. As I said, Theravada Buddhists completely ignore the Mahayana scriptures. Among the Mahayana Buddhist schools, some continue to associate the Mahayana sutras with the historical Buddha. Others recognize that these scriptures were written by unknown authors. But since the profound wisdom and spiritual value of these texts have been evident to so many generations, they are nonetheless preserved and revered as a sutra.

The Mahayana sutras were thought to have been originally written in Sanskrit, but more often than not the oldest existing versions are Chinese translations and the original Sanskrit is lost. Some scholars, however, argue that the earliest Chinese translations are actually the original versions, and their authors claimed to have translated them from Sanskrit to give them greater authority.

This list of the main Mahayana sutras is not complete but provides brief explanations of the most important Mahayana sutras.

Mahayana Buddhists generally accept a different version of Abhidhamma / Abhidharma called Sarvastivada Abhidharma. Rather than the Pali Vinaya, Tibetan Buddhism generally follows another version called Mulasarvastivada Vinaya and the rest of the Mahayana generally follows the Dharmaguptaka Vinaya. And then there are comments, stories and treatises beyond counting.

The many Mahayana schools decide for themselves which parts of this treasure are most important, and most schools emphasize only a small handful of sutras and comments. But it's not always the same handful. So no, there is no "Buddhist Bible".