I like when it is put like this. Research is needed and unless we have been present in the heavens or during the Buddha’s “brief” teaching of Abhidhamma to ven. Sariputta, we cannot speak with dogmatic certainty.
What I didn’t appreciate is the “tone” with which some people reject Abhidhamma as a total baloney made up for fun by some know-it-all monks. This kind of approach is not appropriate and it is the kind of approach that I was refuting.
I believe that everybody has the right to have a doubt. Just please, keep doubt as doubt, not as a “truth.” Honestly, I also do not remember being in the heavens listening to the Buddha as a god or hearing ven. Sariputta recite for me the 7 books of Abhidhamma. All I can say is that I respect my teachers and believe that what they have preserved is either perfect or the most perfect they could do for us. I was never talking about the exactness of Abhidhamma. I was talking about the origin of Abhidhamma as a Pitaka regardless to what extent that may be in comparison to what we have today.
So, thank you @cdpatton for a nice summary of the modern approach to Abhidhamma, I am glad that it is positive.
And finally, I know that neither Abhidhamma nor the Commentaries are perfectly exactly accurate copy of the very first original from the First Buddhist Council to a letter and I have also never claimed it. We can see from accounts of the great master Patthana Sayadaw, the greatest authority on Patthana in Myanmar on the seventh book of Abhidhamma, that there has been undertaken editing in Patthana portion of Abhidhamma even in the Sixth Buddhist Council in terms of the repetitions and that the great master Patthana Sayadaw himself is suggesting literally countless further editing remarks for Patthana in His masterpiece “Guide to Patthana” and the full translation of the first two books of Patthana from Pali to English (which I have read whole).
Or in brief, sadhu, sadhu, sadhu. 