The ' () is a Buddhist scripture, a sutta collection in the Khuddaka NikÃÂya, part of the Sutta Piá¹Âaka of the PÃÂli Canon of TheravÃÂda Buddhism. Sutta Nipata is a collection of discourses of Buddha. It is part of an early corpus of Buddhist literature. Robert Chalmers explains that sutta means a consecutive thread of teaching and Hermann Oldenberg explained that nipata denotes a small collection.
Chalmers says that the materials of the Sutta NipÃÂta are not of equal antiquity but it contains some of the oldest Buddhist compositions. Bharat Singh Upadhyaya, Maurice Winternitz, and Hajime Nakamura are other prominent Buddhist scholars who regard its poetry to have originated in the beginnings of Buddhism. A commentary on Sutta NipÃÂta, called Niddesa, is included in the canon itself which points to the antiquity of the text.
The Bhabru Rock Edicts or Bairat Temple inscription of Ashoka also mentions many texts from this scripture.
The Sutta NipÃÂta is divided into five sections:
I. Uraga Vagga ("The Chapter on the Serpent")
II. Cà «á¸·a Vagga ("The Minor Chapter")
III. MahÃÂ Vagga ("The Great Chapter")
IV. Aá¹Âá¹Âhaka Vagga "The Chapter of Octads"
V. PÃÂrÃÂyana Vagga ("The Chapter on the Way Beyond")
Some scholars believe that it describes the oldest of all Buddhist practices. Others such as the American Theravada Buddhist monk Bhikkhu Bodhi and K. R. Norman agree that it contains much early material. In the Chinese Buddhist canon, a version of the Aá¹Âá¹Âhakavagga has survived. Fragmentary materials from a Sanskrit version of the Nipata also survive. The Niddesa, a commentary in two parts on the contents of the Atthaka Vagga and portions of the Parayana Vagga, is included in the Pali Canon as a book of the Khuddaka NikÃÂya. This commentary is traditionally attributed to à ÂÃÂriputra, and its presence in the canon is regarded as evidence of the relatively early composition of the Sutta NipÃÂta.
Many of the Buddhist legends originate in the Sutta NipÃÂta such as prediction by Asita on the birth of Siddhartha Gautama in the Nalaka sutta or the legendary meeting of King BimbisÃÂra with the Buddha.
Like the authors just mentioned, Hajime Nakamura also considers that the Sutta NipÃÂta is a very ancient collection. According to him, the last two parts, the Aá¹Âá¹Âhaka vagga (Sn. IV) and PÃÂrÃÂyana vagga (Sn. V), already existed during the lifetime of Gotama Buddha.
However, the American TheravÃÂda monk ṬhÃÂnissaro Bhikkhu takes a more nuanced view. He considers that nothing known to date allows us to conclude with certainty that these are texts of primitive Buddhism (without, however, ruling out the possibility).
The Sutta NipÃÂta (PÃÂli), which can be translated as "selection of instructions", "collection of suttas" or "collection of texts", is a collection of suttas from early Buddhism. It is the fifth book of the Khuddaka NikÃÂya, "small texts or small discourses", itself being the fifth part of the Sutta Piá¹Âaka, of which it is probably the oldest part.
Like most early Buddhist collections, it is divided into sections (vagga), five in this case, and contains 70 suttas, plus a prologue and an epilogue,. Among the other canonical texts, only one collection is stylistically close to it, the SagÃÂthàVagga section (SN.I), part of the Saá¹Âyutta NikÃÂya (SN), several of whose suttas are versified in the form of dialogue.
It is distinguished from the other collections of the canon, because all the suttas that compose it are poems written in verse sometimes mixed with a few passages in prose (without any being only in prose). It has 1149 verses.
Three suttas from the Sutta NipÃÂta are among the most famous of ancient Buddhism, such as: (Sn.I.8) MettàSutta; (Sn.II.1) Ratana Sutta (Discourse on the Three Treasures); (Sn.II.4) Maá¹ gala Sutta (Discourse on the Great Blessing). They hold an important place in the ritual of the TheravÃÂda tradition and are recited daily in monasteries, as well as on certain occasions. They are among the texts considered to be protective and sources of spiritual blessing.
Some suttas appear in several collections under the same titles, such as (non-exhaustive list):
The same is true of many verses, which are found in two or even three collections, such as:
In the Chinese Buddhist canon, a version of the Aá¹Âá¹Âhaka Vagga (Sn. IV), as well as fragments of a Sanskrit version of the entire Sutta NipÃÂta (Sn), have been found.
The KhaggavisÃÂnasutta or Rhinoceros Sutra (Sn.I.3) also seems to reveal an early form of Buddhist monasticism, which emphasizes individual quest in a manner close to the Indian tradition of the Sannyasa. A fairly complete version of this sutra was found in the GandhÃÂran Buddhist texts, in 1994, among the oldest known Indian manuscripts.
The two sections Aá¹Âá¹Âhaka Vagga (Sn. IV) and PÃÂrÃÂyana Vagga (Sn. V), are considered to be considerably earlier than the rest of the PÃÂli canon and would reveal an earlier form of Buddhist religion. This view is based on the literary aspect of the texts, their inclusion in the earliest commentaries, but also because they express Buddhist beliefs in a form different from their more common versions.
Luis Oscar Gómez notes that they deal respectively with the issues of sensual pleasures in general (not just sexual), and prajñÃÂ, the process of liberation. Buddhist meditation is approached from an angle closer to the practice of Samatha-Vipassanà(the first and second stages), although later sutras in the canon will teach a balance between the two.
There is also mention of the "world of formlessness", ÃÂrà «pyadhÃÂtu, which has led the author to emphasise the proximity of these teachings to those of the Madhyamika school of Mahayana, in which the notion of emptiness, à Âà «nyatÃÂ, plays a central role.
As far as the relationship between the sections is concerned, Indianist authors have different interpretations: Luis Oscar Gómez considers that the five sections form a homogeneous whole; considers that they constitute a composite whole, because, according to him, certain suttas (notably those of Aá¹Âá¹Âhaka Vagga) would have come from ascetic groups having preceded Siddhartha Gautama, and would have been integrated into the Buddhist corpus afterwards; and André Bareau takes the same line, seeing no logical order in the sections of the Sutta NipÃÂta, unlike the other collections of the canon.
Bhikkhu Bodhi, for his part, considers that:
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