Common Buddhist Text- guidance and insight from the buddha

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So at a meeting of buddhist chaplains today I was given a book ‘Common Buddhist Text- guidance and insight from the buddha’ produced by (here it goes… :sweat_smile:) Mahachulalongkornrajavidyalaya University and contains translation of texts from the Theravada, Mahayana and Vajrayana traditions. It is a great tome that includes suttas, sutras things like milarepa.

Inside it states that ‘it seeks to strike a balance etween what is common to the Buddhist traditions and the diversity of perspectives among them’.

It is split into three parts, ‘Buddha’, ‘Dhamma’ and ‘sangha’ and then divided further into different subjects such as ‘qualities of the Buddha’, ‘ethics’ and ‘exemplary lives’, just to name a few. Under each of these headings there’s a section on what texts each of the major schools has on it.

I am by no means a scholar and can find these things a bit heavy going at times but as i know so little about other traditions I would like to give it a go. I was curious whether anyone had encountered this book. It seems like a good thing to me, something that aims to bridge the traditions and focus on what unites the ‘three vehicles’. Any points of view from the more learned members of this forum would be most welcome.

Theres also a free pdf online here

Much Mettā

Buddho

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Hmmm: Note that the first “PDF” link on that page, you may have to right click and open in a new tab or download the link for it to work… Not sure why it won’t work when you just click on it … Any ideas, web gurus? [EDIT: It seems Chrome now blocks http pdf downloads from an https source]

But yeah! I think the book really is ideal for a “survey of Buddhism” course, hence including it in my survey. In the syllabus you can see I chose a few primary texts for each chapter of Buddhist history to highlight the changes and developments taking place at that time.

But yes, it is quite a tome, and without much commentary, it’s probably best as an anthology alongside a course, rather than as a standalone introduction.

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For me it also doesn’t work with a right click and open in a new tab. How do I “download the link”?

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The right click menu should have an option for “Save link as…” or similar

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P.S. Got it! Downloaded it from the Google Drive link.

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Yes. This is why I provide backup links to Google Drive :slight_smile:

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Okay. The first pdf link has now been fixed (along with 88 other “http” links across the site). :grin:

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Thank you venerables for figuring out the link problem- im not too good with that sort of thing so i appreciate your patience :pray:

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