What might be the best Pāli word for Morality?

The distinction between morality and ethics lies in their scope and origin, though they are often intertwined.

Morality generally refers to individual principles regarding right and wrong, often shaped by personal beliefs, religion, or societal norms. It is deeply rooted in one’s personal conscience and internal compass.

Ethics, on the other hand, is more about external standards set by oneself or a group or society, guiding collective behavior. Ethics is often codified into systems, such as professional guidelines or laws, designed to manage how individuals interact in broader social or professional contexts.

The word sīla is slightly different from morality eventhough it is often translated as morality. English word for sīla would be Virtue. Virtue, in contrast, emphasizes the personal qualities or traits that make someone morally excellent or good. It is concerned with character development and the cultivation of good habits and dispositions. which lines up with the pāli word sīla.

We had a lively discussion a few months ago regarding ethics and morality in the Early Buddhist Texts (EBTs), including this post:

In the whole thread, I don’t recall any disagreement on the fact that sīla is translated into English as morality generally. There were, however, lots of different takes on whether – and how – the EBTs address ethics (and to a lesser extent virtue) as there doesn’t appear to be a clear-cut EBT teaching on ethics relative to strict Pali terminology.

May be worthwhile to glance through the thread. It’s a bit voluminous so it could take a couple days!

:pray:t2: :elephant:

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I dunno, I feel like sīla is broad enough to encompass all of these, which in any case are loosely distinguished in English. A sharper distinction is that “morality” is used by religion, and “ethics” is used in secular contexts, so it sounds more rational. “Ethics” is really just a word for morality used by people who don’t want to sound religious.

The Buddha definitely moved towards a “rational” or empirical approach to sīla, arguing that we can base or choices on what we observe. This supports the translation as “ethics”. On the other hand, he also, as you rightly observed, emphasized the development and cultivation of character, which is closer to “virtue”. But “virtue” is often negatively-coded in English, as is “morality”, which conveys the sense of “moralizing” or lecturing people about their shortcomings. :person_shrugging:

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Many Pāli discourses on sīla are quite obviously not about either morality or ethics. For example, though it’s title is unironically translated as “Virtue” by Bodhi and “Ethics” by Sujato, the text of the Sīla Sutta (SN 46.3) is quite obviously not concerned with either virtues or ethics.

This text is concerned with preparation for meditation (sīla), meditation (samādhi), and the special knowledge that constitutes the fruit of meditation (paññā). That is to say, it’s an elaboration on the 3-fold path (and as such it is related to the Spiral Path or Lokuttara-paṭiccasamuppāda texts such as AN 10.1, AN 10.2, AN 10.3 etc).

Incidentally, I haven’t written it up yet, but I’ve come around to thinking that this kind of description of meditation is a distinct alternative to jhāna or suññatā descriptions of mediation. Perhaps a distinct sect dimly remembered?

The only part of the Sīla Sutta that is not concerned with samādhi and paññā—which must therefore be the part concerned with sīla (and additionally occurs at the beginning of the text prior to samādhi)—is the injunction to pursue vūpakāsa (vi-ava-√kṛṣ) “withdrawal, separation, isolation” of both body and mind. For comparison: Skt. vyavakarṣati “to draw down or drag down, to drag away from, tear away, alienate.”

I take vūpakāsa to be synonymous with Pāli amanasikāra and Skt. anupalambha; i.e. concerned with dragging one’s attention away from sensory experience, with a view to making it stop.

Morality is concerned how we govern our behaviour towards other people. In general, morality takes the form of simple rules: “do this behaviour” and “don’t do that behaviour”. The five precepts and the dasakusalakamma are classic sets of moral rules. Don’t kill, don’t lie, don’t steal, etc. And, moreover, these kinds of moral rules tend to be universal in human cultures. Ingroup killing and ingroup dishonesty are universally despised. We have to know we can rely on group members since we are an obligate social primate. But in the Sīla Sutta there are no such rules.

Moreover, generally speaking, Buddhist morality operates through karma. Good actions (punyakamma) lead to rebirth in a good place (sujāto); and bad actions (pāpakamma) lead to rebirth in a band place (duggato); although, of course, the summum bonum is to stop making karma, by eliminating cetenā. In SN 46.3 there is no mention of kamma at all.

The stated purpose of pursuing vūpakāsa is not moral per se—i.e. it is not concerned with governing behaviour—rather dragging your attention away from other people is explicitly stated to facilitate the arising of the various “enlightenment factors” (sambojjhaṅga) such as mindfulness, investigation of phenomena, and so.

Seen in this light, isolating from other people in body and mind cannot really be considered a “moral action” or a “virtuous action” because it is not orientated towards other people. It is oriented towards internally stimulating the enlightenment factors.

An injunction not to interact with other people or even to think about them, seems to be the antipode of morality. Moreover, the instructions here are not phrased as specific moral rules.

So, to my way of thinking to reduction of sīla to “ethics” or “virtue”, not only broadly ignores the moral/ethical distinction, it also ignores one of the most important ways that the term is used in Pāli. And as Wittegenstein said

For a large class of cases—though not for all—in which we employ the word “meaning” it can be defined thus: the meaning of a word is its use in the language.
—Wittgenstein. 1967. Philosophical Investigations. Sect. 43

This example, yet again, highlights the downside of approaching this literature in translation, especially where the translator is religious. The sectarian predilections of the translator play an inordinate role in how we understand the message of the literature. All too often, the message of the translator supervenes.

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We are fortunate as readers of Buddhist texts to know that action is not just by body or speech, but also of mind. The principle of avoiding misconduct that is first applied to body and speech extends even to the mind, and from that point of view - taking mindfulness and samadhi into account - it is clear that this principle of avoiding unwholesome is the foundation of an internal purification.

From another point of view, there is an external perspective consider, which takes into account what this avoidance of misconduct looks like to others, or rather, the effect it would have on others. And it really is only from this external perspective that morality could be discussed - as a byproduct of what has or has not been taken up internally.

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Indeed, there is not even a broad agreement about how to define morality vs. ethics in English, so it’s quite hard not to get bogged down in this (in my opinion not very useful) debate.

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Very true, sīla is not merely that which is protected by an inner sense of conscience, which we can see from the fact that even arahants can and do break Vinaya rules. It’s also what matters culturally and as a society.

Which, incidentally, points to the limitations of “consent” and individual preference have as components of morality.

Indeed, I agree, it’s an area where you just choose one of a few possible terms, or a few of them, and let the context do the heavy lifting.

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Hi Bhante,

It seems that this external perspective is abstract when compared to the formal choice to avoid specific misconduct. It is a less immediate account from an impersonal position, which is what I believe distinguishes morality from sīla.

Also, the choice to avoid misconduct is not going to be universally accepted as best by others, because not everyone is receptive to the factual rightness that is associated with the avoidance of unwholesome. Even a person who avoids killing may face ridicule by others. Same thing with the other precepts. Many cultural norms are immoral from the point of view of precepts, so if sīla meant being (in some cases) obligated to take them into consideration, that could put the development of virtue at risk.

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This is so worthy of more exploration.

Helps me think through where I was trying to go here:

I have thought about starting a new thread around this…not meaning to overtake this one.

SN 46.3 was titled with the first item in the list it discusses, which is pretty typical of early Buddhist titling practices. The title is sometimes only a mnemonic keyword that helps the reciter begin a memorized text. Naturally, it’s often the first keyword of a central list of keywords. The same thing happens with whole chapters in early sutra collections. They are sometimes titled after the first sutta, which might not represent the content of the rest of the chapter at all. The title of the chapter cues the reciter which sutta to begin with, and then they recall the suttas that follow it.

It’s more than a little obtuse to try to redefine the word “sila” based on the entire content of a sutta titled in this way.

Of course, early sutras aren’t always titled in that way. The titles of SN 46.3’s parallels do represent it’s content rather than choosing the first keyword that occurs in a list.

If a person takes the time to read the texts that gives us the import and meaning of sila, we find that the path begins with mastering the precepts. It isn’t an invention of modern translators. It can be found in the gradual path program laid out in EBTs in various Buddhist schools (e.g., DN 2, MA 80, DA 20) and in later commentaries from classical times.

Precepts also precede any serious attainments in the paramita program of bodhisattva practice. The only thing preliminary to precepts is generosity. Please read the classical descriptions of the sila paramita and report back to us how it supports this argument that translating sila as “morality” or “ethics” is a poor choice by modern translators.

There are also Chinese meditation manuals that provide some context to actual meditation practice at the time. The first line of one attributed to Kumarajiva (T616) reads:

行者初來欲受法時,師問五眾戒淨已
What a practitioner first arrives wanting to receive the Dharma, the teacher asks them, “Have you been pure in the five categories of precepts?”

And then the text describes a series of preliminary practices designed to rid the practitioner of whatever mental imbalances involving greed, hate, delusion that they may have before embarking on the serious practice of meditation.

That’s just a couple examples of the context that’s evident throughout Buddhist literature. I would encourage people to actually read Buddhist literature to understand the words that are used in it rather than cherry-picking cases where the meaning isn’t evinced or relevant at all.

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Interesting sutta, in that it foregrounds the role of what Girard calls mimesis in the role of spiritual development. We see someone we admire, and aspire to emulate them. The Buddhist perspective solves Girard’s supposed trap of the scapegoat, since the desired object—liberation—is the end of desire, so we are not bound in a cycle of violence as he supposes.

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Well, Charles, no one would know from your response, that my comments were about the simple fact that śīla signifies something other than “ethics” or “morality” in some Buddhist texts, i.e. it sometimes signifies quite precisely preparation for meditation. And that any definition of śīla which excludes this well-attested usage is incomplete.

Nothing in your response even addresses, let alone refutes, this straightforward proposition.

@moderators, these attempts to belittle me should have no place in civilised discourse.

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Snark seems on the rise here.

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According to Saṃyuktābhidharmahṛdaya 雜阿毘曇心論 sila is : practice or cultivation , in tune with samadhi , cooling and peaceful sleeps .

According to Abhidharma-mahāvibhāṣā-śāstra 大毘婆沙論 , it defined sila as follow :
清涼 cooling、安眠 peaceful sleeps、數習 skillful habits、得定 gain stillness etc .

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I’ve always thought that there is a nuanced difference between ethics and morality.

It seems to me that morals are what is considered right or wrong based on established rules. Ethics seem to me to be a broad framework by which decisions are made. Intention plays into the equation too.

Morals can be upheld by “technicalities” but ethics get to the heart of the matter. i.e., a person can have a secret emotional affair with a person who isn’t their spouse and not break the rule of adultery but ethics could guard from letting it get that far in the first place. Ethics can be the rudder that steers intention, thinking and behavior but morality is the outward action. I’ve known lots of moral people who are ethical and lots of people who are moral but not ethical. Evangelists spring to mind!

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From the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy:

More particularly, the term “morality” can be used either

  1. descriptively to refer to certain codes of conduct put forward by a society or a group (such as a religion), or accepted by an individual for her own behavior, or

  2. normatively to refer to a code of conduct that, given specified conditions, would be put forward by all rational people.

A great example of the first can be found in AN 10.50, which describes ten things that, “make for fondness and respect, conducing to inclusion, harmony, and unity, without quarreling”. We find virtue at the top of this list, but we also find:

  • a mendicant is very learned
  • a mendicant has good friends, companions, and associates
  • a mendicant is easy to admonish, having qualities that make them easy to admonish
  • a mendicant is deft and tireless in a diverse spectrum of duties for their spiritual companions, …
  • a mendicant loves the teachings and is a delight to converse with, being full of joy in the teaching and training
  • a mendicant lives with energy roused up for giving up unskillful qualities and embracing skillful qualities.
  • a mendicant is content with any kind of robes, almsfood, lodgings, and medicines and supplies for the sick. …
  • a mendicant is mindful
  • a mendicant is wise

What’s interesting is these are not things that can be merely emulated, so even though this is describing a code of conduct of sorts, it isn’t one that anyone can just start to live by. From this point of view, morality isn’t even something that would be practiced directly. It will be the result of some very specific accomplishments whether they want it to be or not.

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Good point presented.

But precept is about a rule intended to regulate action, behaviour or thought, especially obtained from moral thought.

SN 47.16 and its corresponding SA 624 state in common that sīla is a fundament (ādi) for practising the four stations/kinds of sati ‘mindfulness’.

So, I think sīla can be both precept and morality.

Choong Mun-keat translates sīla as “morality/precept” (see pp. 230-231 in The Fundamental Teachings of Early Buddhism).

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I sometimes hear that in Buddhist modernistic propaganda, which likes to ‘tone down’ the precepts. At least four of five precepts seem to me to be quite extraordinary, when compared to other moral codes. To begin with the first: how many religions or dharmas object to the killing of any animal for any purpose under any circumstances? One (Jainism) comes to mind… and it has the five precepts. The minimal sexual prohibitions and the strict stance against intoxicants are also unlike many human cultures.

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I have no idea what this sentence means. Sweeping generalisations are seldom helpful or accurate. “Some people say”… is classic weasel words.

… is not Buddhism.

It seems weird to have to insist on this.

Uh huh. Except… Oh yeah…

“You shall not covet your neighbor’s house. You shall not covet your neighbor’s wife, or his male or female slaves, his ox or donkey, or anything that belongs to your neighbor.” — Exodus 20:17

“O you who believe! Strong drink and games of chance and idols and divining arrows are only an infamy of Satan’s handiwork. Leave it aside in order that ye may succeed.” —Quran 5:90.

Etc.

Your most interesting claim is that Jains “ban all animal killing”, which may be true, but this is not a moral rule that Buddhists have ever adopted. And, thus, not a reflection of Buddhist moral rules generally.

You claim that: “At least four of five precepts seem to me to be quite extraordinary”. But you are unable to show that a single one of them is even a tiny bit extraordinary. Rather, as I said, these types of prohibition on (in-group) killing, stealing, dishonesty, etc tend to be universally agreed on for obvious reasons.

In fact, as the late great Frans de Waal noted, one can find some of these moral behaviours, at least in some form, amongst wild primates: because all morality is based on two behavioural capacities: empathy and reciprocity. My take on is covered in one short and two long blog essays:

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I have no idea what this sentence means

Presenting the five precepts as universal morality is a common strategy among modern Buddhist authors and teachers:

“The five precepts constitute basic human morality” (Yuttadhammo Bhikkhu).

“Like many teachers of different religions Buddha also taught about sila, the five precepts” (S. N. Goenka).

Etc.

This ‘universalization’ of the precepts often entails reinterpreting them in reductive and anthropocentric ways, to conform to foreign moral codes.

You shall not covet…

The Torah has a long set of sexual prohibitions, including the death penalty for such infractions as MMF trios. Very unlike the minimal definitions of sexual misconduct in, say, the Pāli texts (described by José I. Cabezón as ‘certain minimal norms that men should follow’).

Quran 5:90

I don’t understand what you are trying to prove with this quote—that a doctrinal prohibition of alcohol is ‘universal in human cultures’? Far from it, I’d say.

Your most interesting claim is that Jains “ban all animal killing”

What I claimed is that both dharmas object to all animal killing in their precepts, and that feature strikes me as cross-culturally exceptional.

this is not a moral rule that Buddhists have ever adopted

Some communities got very close, not only in the Mahāyāna and not only of the so-called ‘Protestant Buddhist’ variety (e.g., movements within the Burmese ‘Karen’ or around Lanna khrubas). Your generalization about “Buddhists” is not historically or ethnographically informed. In any case, I was talking about standard scriptural precepts, regardless of whatever Buddhists do or did at particular times and places.

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