Pali Canon

The Pali Canon (English) or Tipiṭaka (Pali) is the scripture collection of Theravada Buddhism which is, in the view of most scholars, an extremely conservative form of 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".

The English name comes from Pali, its language. The commonest name in the tradition is Tipitaka (tipiṭaka), meaning "three baskets", after the commonest arrangement of the Canon (see below).

Authorship

The tradition alone has two different concepts of authorship, neither of which corresponds to modern Western ideas. The whole of the Canon is traditionally described as "The Word of the Buddha" (Buddhavacana). This is not intended literally, the Canon in fact including teachings by followers and accounts of events after the Buddha's death. Being actually said by the historical Buddha is not a necessary requirement for counting as Buddhavacana. The tradition subdivides the Canon, with most but not all classified as "spoken by the Buddha" (Buddhabhāsita). However, this concept still includes cases where the Buddha is reported to have repeated things previously said by others, and even where he simply expresses approval. It also sometimes includes expansions of his sayings in accordance with his methodology.

Scholars vary in their views. Professor Gombrich holds that a good deal of the content of the Canon (perhaps a third), but not usually the exact words, goes back to the Buddha. He admits, however, that very few sholars go that far, and that nearly all the Canon is anonymous, strictly speaking.

Date

Here, one can distinguish earliest, average and latest (for the compilation of the Canon as a collection, see below). Most scholars date the Buddha's death around 400 BC, and would agree that some parts of the Canon at least resemble things the Buddha himself taught. Thus the earliest date would be 5th century BC.

The late Professor A. K. Warder seems to envisage an average date of 4th century BC

L. S. Cousins (sometime President of the Pali Text Society) argues that much of the Canon was originally very fluid in form, improvised within a patern of teaching, and only gradually crystallizing into a body of literature, a process only completed when the Canon was written down. Recations to this from other scholars have been mixed.

Some scholars claim that little or nothing has been added since the Canon was written down in the last century BC. The Parivara, however, is usually dated to the 1st century AD and late dates are also sometimes given for other books. The late Professor Hajime Nakamura says some material cannot have been earlier than the 2nd century AD. These latest dates given by scholars exclude the more recent additions in some editions of the Canon. Those texts, even if added in comparatively modern times, are not themselves modern works, albeit perhaps not quite as old as the others.

Text

The climate of Theravada countries is not conducive to the survival of manuscripts. Apart from brief quotations in inscriptions, and a two-page fragment from the 8th or 9th century found in Nepal, the oldest known manuscripts date from the 15th century, and there are few from before the 18th. 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, but not yet in Laos. 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 the Supreme Patriarch of Thailand did sponsor a transcript of its edition in 2005. Modern scholars try to compare these editions, which is made easier by the existence of electronic transcripts, except for the Khmer edition, of which few copies survived the Khmers Rouges.

Canon

A standard list of books in the Canon appears in a number of classic commentaries (5th century?). One of those commentaries, however, gives some alternative listings of contents of the Khuddaka Nikaya. Some scholars take these as representing different stages of the canonization process. As noted above, some scholars think little or nothing was added to the Canon after it was written down in the last century BC. On the other hand, Professor Samuel holds that those commentators were largely responsible for the canonization.

A subcommentary on the above mentioned commentary, probably written in the 10th century, explains the apparent differences in lists by saying that books not mentioned were in fact counted as parts of other books, and a later subcommentary, written about 1800, uses the same method to include in the Canon at least two books not known to have been ever before mentioned as such. The Sixth Council edition of the Canon includes three such books, two of which are also in the Sinhalese Buddha Jayanti edition. At least 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.

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.