Adding Bhikkhu Bodhi's translation

Translations
1

Dear Admin,

I cannot find Bhikkhu Bodhi’s translation for a number of suttas on suttacentral.net. Are they missing ? the 3 books published by Wisdom publication contain full translation of MN , SN , AN :

  • Bhikkhu Nanamoli & Bhikkhu Bodhi 1995, The Middle Length Discourses of the Buddha: A New Translation of the Majjhima Nikaya, Wisdom Publications.
  • Bhikkhu Bodhi 2000, The Connected Discourses of the Buddha: A New Translation of the Samyutta Nikaya, Wisdom Publications.
  • Bhikkhu Bodhi 2012, The Numerical Discourses of the Buddha: A Translation of the Anguttara Nikaya, Wisdom Publications**.

Some of those missing suttas I consider very important, such as SN 12.10, MN 10.
It would be wonderful if this website can have all of Bhikkhu Bodhi’s translation of the nikayas.

Best regards

1 Like
2

This is due to copyright restrictions by Wisdom Publications. Only for some Suttas, publication on SuttaCentral has been permitted by the publisher.

2 Likes
3

thank you! I wonder why they restricted it. Did Bhikkhu Bodhi charge any for his translation? If he did not charge, could he share his translation file/ebook or have someone close to him distributing the translation (ebook, printing out) for free? Should the translation be free and accessible for all, like other translators (Thanissaro Bhikkhu, Bikkhu Sujato) did?

Most importantly, the supposed original source of nikayas - Gotama the Awakened One himself did not charge any thing on anyone?!

4

Although on the publication page of the print books it says the Bhante (Bhikkhu) Bodhi holds the copyright, as with (all?) commercial publications, the copyright is actually held by Wisdom Publications.

Bhante was approached by Wisdom long time ago to have him edit Ven. Nyanamoli’s MN translation. This was before the internet was a thing the way it is now. Because of a positive relationship over the years, they have continued to publish his books, with the very generous provision that large portions are available on line for free, in addition to a steeply reduced price for the same books sold in Asia.

Although SC may not have the suttas you want translated by him, what is available is still almost a third of each book.

I believe there are plenty of other threads discussing the issue of copyrights of Buddhist texts. It would be good to continue the conversation there since your original question has been answered.

We don’t really need a new thread about the topic, IMO.

5 Likes