I’m sure you’re all familiar with the claim that there are 84,000 scriptures in Buddhism. The claim ultimately stems from Ven Ananda’s Theragatha verses. It’s difficult to asses how literally it was meant, as it is not clear exactly how the texts were counted. If we expand all the abbreviated texts it would be a very large number. But normally, if we take each individual sutta, there are around 7,500 texts in the Pali canon.
It occurred to me today that SC is probably getting to about 84,000 texts, and I just checked and that’s correct. I’d have to filter it a bit to see the exact number, but it’s around 84,000, maybe a little more.
This includes all the root texts in Pali, Chinese, Tibetan. and Sanskrit, as well as the translations in over forty languages. Congratulations to all our helpers and volunteers who have made it possible to collate so many texts. And to all the translators, editors, and those who have maintained the texts for 2,500 years.
