Compassion in the Agamas and Nikayas

[Aloka]

An article which is definately worth reading :

"Compassion in the Agamas and Nikayas" by Bhikkhu Analayo.

https://www.buddhismuskunde.uni-hamb...compassion.pdf

- A paragraph of interest:

Even after awakening, the Buddha's form of compassion does not seem to be depicted as being motivated by the wish to save all living beings. A discourse in the Aṅguttara-nikāya and its Saṃyukta-āgama parallel explicitly highlight that the Buddha was not concerned with whether the whole world or only part of it will be able to reach liberation.

(The Nikaya sutta reference is AN10.95)


Comments welcome if you've read the article.

......and just as an aside, Bhikkhu Analayo has also written a book "Compassion and Emptiness in Early Buddhist Meditation".

[Aloka]

Bhikkhu Analayo has also written a book "Compassion and Emptiness in Early Buddhist Meditation".

An excerpt from the book can be found here:

https://issuu.com/windhorsepublications/docs/ce_excerpt

[philg]

The vow to liberate all beings is powerful when repeated over the years, but I never took it literally. It's similar to the vow to give away all merit. Does anything happen? Frankly I don't think it's important whether anything does, but it has an effect on me whenever I say it. I think such things are powerful as reminders rather than expectations of real events.

[CedarTree]

Bhikkhu Analayo is such a prolific writer. So glad a lot of his stuff is freely available on his university page :)

[Aloka]

Here's an interview Bhikkhu Analayo gave about his book "Compassion and Emptiness in Early Buddhist Meditation" which I mentioned earlier :

https://www.bcbsdharma.org/article/c...brahmaviharas/

[ancientbuddhism]

The Fundamental Teachings of Early Buddhism: A comparative study based on the Sūtrāṅga portion of the Pāli Saṃyutta-Nikāya and the Chinese Saṃyuktāgama – Choong Mun-keat (2000)

[McKmike]

Thanks ancientbuddhism this looks like a very good book, will take a while to read though, the foreword does give a good idea of the breath and scope

McKmike