Kinh tạng

A fabulous courtesan, a guilty king, a know-it-all teen, learned sages and earnest fools, a silent meditation in a thunderstorm. The Long Discourses reveal a Buddha in vital engagement with his times, an ideal of humanity in whom the extraordinary comes alive. These thirty-four discourses are set in an age of wonder, when prophecy was fulfilled and the deep truth of humanity was spoken, laid bare with sparkling clarity and relentless insight. In these tales set in the slow paths, chaotic cities, and deep forests of northern India, in the shadowy past or even among the gods themselves, we see the humble monk Gotama, wise and compassionate teacher of mindfulness and morality, begin his long and storied transformation into the Buddha of legend.

The Middle Discourses (Majjhima Nikāya, abbreviated MN) is a collection of 152 discourses in the Pali canon (Tipiṭaka) of the Theravada school of Buddhism. The word “middle” refers to the length of the individual discourses. This is perhaps the most popular collection of early discourses. It contains a wide variety of teachings, many of them presented as narratives between the Buddha and a diverse range of his contemporaries. The collection parallels the Madhyamāgama (MA) of the Sarvāstivāda school, which survives as a translation in the Chinese canon.

The “Linked” or “Connected” Discourses (Saṁyutta Nikāya, abbreviated SN) is a collection of over a thousand short discourses in the Pali canon. The word “linked” refers to the fact that the texts are collected and organized by topic. In most cases the organizing principle is a particular theme of Dhamma, for example, the five aggregates, dependent origination, the noble eightfold path, mindfulness meditation, or the four noble truths. This collection contains the most extensive range of texts on these core themes. In other cases chapters are organized according to the person or kind of person who speaks. This collection has a full parallel in the Saṁyuktāgama (SA) of the Sarvāstivāda school in Chinese translation. In addition, there are two partial collections in Chinese (SA-2 and SA-3) as well as a number of miscellaneous or fragmentary texts in Chinese, Sanskrit, and Tibetan. Much of the organizational structure of SN is shared with SA, suggesting that this structure preceded the split between these two collections.

The “Numbered” or “Numerical” Discourses are usually known as Aṅguttara Nikāya in Pali, abbreviated AN. However, the Pali tradition also knows the form Ekottara (“one-up” or “incremental”), and this is the form usually found in the northern collections. These collections organize texts in numbered sets, from one to eleven. Compared to the other <i lang='pi' translate='no'>nikāyas</i>, they are more oriented to the lay community. The Ekottarikāgama (EA) in Chinese is a highly unusual text, which features a range of variations within itself when it comes even to basic doctrines. It shares considerably less in common with the Pali Aṅguttara than the other collections do with their counterparts. In addition, there is a partial Ekottarikāgama in Chinese, as well as a variety of individual discourses and fragments in Chinese and Sanskrit.

The word <i lang='pi' translate='no'>khuddaka</i> means “lesser” or “minor”, and it seems that this category originally served to collect certain short collections, mostly verse, that were not conveniently assigned to one of the main <i lang='pi' translate='no'>nikāyas</i>. Over time, however, the collection grew, so that the Khuddaka in the Pali canon today is the largest of the <i lang='pi' translate='no'>nikāyas</i>. It includes some of the most popular texts in Theravāda Buddhism, such as the Dhammapada, the Sutta Nipāta, and the Jātakas. There is no closely parallel collection in the other canons, but many of the early texts have parallels in various places.