Dhammapada
Introduction

The Dhammapada, is among the most popular canonical texts in the Buddhist world. It is quoted by politicians, and students learn it by heart in the original Pali in Buddhist schools in countries such as Sri Lanka. New translations of it appear in print every few years. In fact it has had a remarkable history of being translated into other languages, beginning with the oldest Chinese version called Fa-chu-ching, which is known to have been done in 224 after Christ.

The Dhammapada that is translated in this volume is the Pali version of a type of text which was in use among Buddhists from very ancient times. Like all religious texts in Pali, it belongs to the Theravada school of the Buddhist tradition whose adherents are at present found primarily in Kampuchea, Laos, Myanmar, Sri Lanka, and Thailand. The origin of the text, however, goes back to the formative days of the Theravada school in India in the two or three centuries that followed the death of the Buddha. Some at least of the other Buddhist schools that originated in India around the same time also had their own versions of this text. Four complete or nearly complete versions are extant: (1) the Pali Dhammapada; (2) the Gandhari Dharmapada in the Prakrit language of Gandhara in the north-west of the Indian subcontinent, surmised to belong to the Dharmaguptaka school; (3) the Dharmapada of the Sarvastivada school in mixed Sanskrit, called the Udanavarga, and (4) the text known as the Patna Dharmapada, which was published for the first time in 1979 and which is in a partly Sanskritised language somewhat akin to Pali. It has been surmised that this may be the Dharmapada of the Mahisasaka school. Quotations from a Dharmapada chapter in the Mahavastu, a work in mixed Sanskrit of the ancient Mahasanghika Lokottaravada school, provide evidence of a fifth version.

The title Dhammapada means “sayings of dharma” (or dharma if we use the Sanskrit form of the word). Dhamma/dharma signifies specifically “the Buddha’s teaching”, but more generally also “religious truth” or what morally uplifts and sustains the person who lives according to it. The title therefore implies that the text contains religiously inspiring statements made by the Buddha on various occasions. They are all in verse. A considerable number of them are also found in other works of the Buddhist canon. Moreover, equivalents of a few of these verses are also found, with varying degrees of difference, among old Indian aphoristic verses in such works as the epic Mahabharata.

How could such a text, with several versions in different ancient Buddhist languages and verses whose counterparts are found in non-Buddhist Indian works, have originated among the Buddhists in the first place? It would have been easy to answer this question if we could say that one of them is the original Dhammapada and the others are translations of it into the different languages that the early Buddhists used. Unfortunately it is not as easy as that, although some used to think that the Pali text was the original Dhammapada. These texts, though undoubtedly of one genre, are also considerably different from one another. They differ in size and arrangement, and frequently in the wording of individual stanzas, the Patna Dharmapada (of which only a single manuscript has survived) indicates that it originally consisted of 502 stanzas, although the extant manuscript has only 414. The Udanavarga with more than 1,000 stanzas is the longest. The Gandhari Dharmapada, about 40 per cent of which is missing in the only available manuscript on which the printed editions are based, is estimated to have had about 540 stanzas.

It is the same with arrangement. All texts of this genre agree in distributing the verses they contain in a number of chapters or “groups” (vagga in Pali, varga in Sanskrit). For these chapter headings, the different Dharmapadas often use the same titles, or synonymous titles (and also a few that are specific to each version), but the verses that appear under the same or similar titles are not identical in the different versions. There are some common verses under a common chapter heading, but the number of such verses among the different versions is disproportionate.

A considerable number of the individual stanzas can be regarded as nearly “identical,” if we disregard the linguistic differences that are naturally to be expected in these compilations (which are, after all, in different though closely related dialects or languages). More often, however, they are not quite identical, but, rather, contain a variant word or phrase or line (behind which a text critic might on occasion find quite a treasure trove!). But, as the numbers mentioned above would indicate, there are also, apart from these “identical” and similar verses, a varying number of stanzas exclusive to each version of this genre of texts. One must hasten to add, however, that, even in this exclusivity, there is a similarity that should not be overlooked. A verse may be found in one Dharmapada that is not found in another; as a dharma saying, it could have been just as eligible for inclusion in any of these texts, but it was not the preference of a particular compiler or compilers to include that verse in the text concerned.

In the end, the question of how this kind of text originated and proliferated is paired with the question of how the Buddhist canonical texts came into existence, how the Buddhist sects or schools evolved, and what the languages were that the different schools used.

It would appear that even during the Buddha’s lifetime there were monks who were able to recount from memory the contents of his discourses which they had either heard directly or had learned from reports that circulated among his disciples. There is evidence to show that the gist of some important discourses had even been turned into verse and memorised in that form.

Soon after the death of the Buddha, it appears that leading members of the community of monks set to work on compiling an authoritative corpus of discourses relating to his teaching and to the discipline which he enjoined on the monks. The different schools of the Buddhist tradition have left accounts of this momentous undertaking in Buddhist history. On its main events they are in broad agreement, though they differ over details. This activity started with the summoning of an assembly of the most respected members of the Sangha (the community of monks) at Rajagaha, capital city of the kingdom of Magadha. At this assembly, generally referred to as the First Council, it was decided that Ananda, who as the Buddha’s personal attendant had the widest knowledge of the events of the Teacher’s life, should rehearse the contents of his speeches and conversations as he remembered them, with some description of the circumstances associated with each such discourse. Ananda’s long report, constituting a narration of the many separate events, was formally endorsed by the assembled monks, and by common consent it was later named the Sutta Pitaka (“Basket” of Discourses), which in turn was subdivided into a number of “collections”. A similar report, dealing with matters connected with the promulgation of the code of discipline (Vinaya) which was to be followed by the Sangha, was made by the monk Upali and was accepted by the assembly, later to be designated the Vinaya Pitaka (the “Basket” of the Discipline). There is no evidence of the adoption of a third similar compilation at this assembly, but the Buddhist tradition as a whole acknowledges the existence of a third “Basket” known as the Abhidhamma Pitaka. It probably developed in later times by a process of systematisation and elaboration of certain lists of principles which seem to have been mentioned at this rehearsal. The Basket of Discourses was subdivided into a number of “collections.” Among them was the Minor Collection (Khuddaka-nikaya) which consisted of a number of separate works. Whether this collection dates back to the original rehearsal is not altogether certain, because several of the ancient schools mention it as a canonical text while several others do not. Many works of the Minor Collection are characterised by comparative brevity; a number of them also happen to be among the most popular works of the Buddhist canon. An interesting notice in a later Pali commentary on one of these works – the Itivuttaka – informs us that its contents were in the first instance memorised by a slave girl who heard the Buddha teaching them to the monks. It was the “recovery” of those teachings through her (she had become a lay devotee of the Buddha) that led to them being rehearsed as the First Council. This may be taken as an indication of the Minor Collection and of the reason why there was no unanimity of opinion on the suitability of these works to be reckoned as part of the canon. The Dhammapada finds its place in the canon as one of the works of the Minor Collection. Since many of its verses are also found elsewhere in the canon, the unavoidable conclusion is that it cannot be regarded as a report of a discourse or even of several discourses, in the same sense as some of the other works of the canon can be so described. Rather, it consists for the most part of metrical portions that had been taken over from various discourses; for that reason it has an anthological character. But it was accorded canonical status, and it cannot be regarded as merely an anthology.

With our present knowledge, we can say that a compilation of dharma verses appears to have been in existence from very early times – almost certainly from before the formation of separate schools – and this was considered as part of the Buddhist canon. However, we cannot speak of a definite “text” which was the “original Dharmapada”. What is more likely is that what were called dharmapadani or dharma verses when referring to works of the Minor Collection may have been something more fluid than a “text”. They might rather have constituted a “quasi-text”, open-ended as it were, which allowed the various schools to restructure them considerably and add more verses taken from other acceptable sources. (Many other works adopted at the First Council also seem to have remained more or less as such quasi-texts, which were subjected to certain changes in the different schools, until they were “fixed” by being turned into written works about the beginning of the Christian era.) The extant Dhammapada of the Theravada school contains several verses which on good grounds can be deemed to have been added to an originally shorter text.

Judging from the number of common verses in the extant texts of this genre, we can surmise that this early “quasi-text”, which came to be regarded as an essential part of the sacred works of several Buddhist schools, must have been considerably smaller than either of the two smallest of the extant dharma texts – namely, the Pali Dhammapada of the Theravada school or the Patna Dharmapada. It could be said that the extant Dharmapadas developed from this “quasi-text” by a process of linguistic redaction, expansion of content, and chapter rearrangement. Neither the basic format nor the essential nature of the contents was affected by this process.

Regarding the process of linguistic redaction, it is a historical fact that the most sacred works of the Buddhist tradition – its canonical texts – are preserved in several languages. The only complete recension to survive in an ancient Indian language is the Pali canon, but varyingly incomplete recensions have been preserved in several related Indo-Aryan languages. Most of these show signs of having been affected by a process of Sanskritisation; that is, texts which were originally in some Indo-Aryan vernaculars have been “polished” by changing the words as far as possible into their corresponding Sanskrit forms.

Apparently this process was a result of the re-emergence of the prestige of the Sanskrit tradition in India with the fall of the Mauryan Empire in the second century BC, after the setbacks it experienced due to the efflorescence of religious movements during nearly three centuries after the time of the Buddha. The process of Sanskritisation seems to have gathered more momentum after the hitherto orally transmitted texts were committed to writing. Hence, the later a version of a work assumed written form, the more Sanskritised the language tends to be. Buddhist texts that were taken out of India before the beginning of the Christian era appear to have escaped the more blatant aspects of this artificial process of Sanskritisation.

The Sanskritisation, however, was never a complete transformation, and the affected texts are full of forms which are inadmissible in classical Sanskrit. With the help of these “hybrid” words, modern research has been painstakingly trying to unravel the identities of the original languages that lie behind these Sanskritised Buddhist texts. The evidence brought to light in this was shows that the Buddhist canonical texts were originally compiled and preserved in several languages, possibly four or more.

The extant Dhammapada recensions reflect this situation perfectly. The Pali Dhammapada would have naturally been brought to Sri Lanka in the third century BC with the official introduction of the Theravada tradition to the island (said to have been the work of missionaries sent by Emperor Asoka), or shortly thereafter along with the other sacred texts of the tradition. (It is not quite correct to say that “texts” were brought. It was not customary to commit sacred works to writing; they were preserved only in the memory of those who dedicated themselves to their study. In a sense, therefore, the text were not physically apart from the missionaries themselves.) The results was that the Pali Dhammapada, along with other Theravada canonical works, escaped much of the Sanskritic influence to which texts of the Indian schools were subjected; they were preserved largely in the linguistic form which had evolved by about the third century BC among the adherents of Theravada for purposes of their religious activities. (It must be stated, however, that even in the evolution of that linguistic form Sanskrit seems to have been a major influence).

When the Theravada canon was committed to writing in Sri Lanka about the beginning of the Christian era, it put a halt to any further large-scale modifications of the texts. But a close examination of the material of the Dhammapada reveals that at some earlier stage, parts of it had been considerably different in form, and they had been modified to conform to the characteristics which are normative of the language of the Theravada canon. (This is also true of the other canonical texts). According to the Theravada tradition, this language is Magadhi, that is, the language of Magadha, the region of ancient India in which the Buddha for the most part conducted his mission. Modern scholarship generally discounts this view.

As for the Gandhari Dharmapada, its text was recovered thanks to the fact that two French travellers, MM. Dutreuil de Rhins and Grenard, and a Russian diplomat, N. Th. Petrovskii, independently acquired in 1892 two parts of a very ancient birch-bark manuscript written in the Kharosthi script, which according to reports was discovered in the valley of the Karakash river, 21 kilometres from Khotan. (A third portion of this priceless document, which seems to have been withheld by the persons who sold it, has not yet been recovered.) The manuscript, dated to the first or second century after Christ, is one of the oldest discovered in the Indian subcontinent. At this time, and in this remote part of the land, the process of Sanskritization had obviously not yet advanced very far; therefore, the text of this Dharmapada is preserved in a linguistic form which is still a Prakrit – a “vernacular” language – and in this instance Gandhari, the language of Gandhara. The Patna Dharmapada was discovered by Rahula Sankrtyayana among Indian manuscripts in Tibet in 1934. The work has been printed based on photographs of this single manuscript, which has been dated in the second half of the twelfth century. The language of the work is a Sanskritised Prakrit, but some of the word forms found in it preserve features that are more archaic than their correspondents in the Pali text.

The Udanavarga is a Dharmapada text that modern scholarship has recovered from numerous fragmentary manuscript remains discovered in East Turkestan, where it was obviously a phenomenally popular work. A unique fact about this Dharmapada is that its Chinese translator of the fourth century, as well as a well-known Sanskrit Abhidharma commentator, Yasomitra, of the eighth century, ascribed its compilation to a particular individual called Dharmatrata, a celebrated doctor of the Sarvastivada school, who lived in the first century after Christ. The Abhidharma commentator says that Dharmatrata extracted various dharma verses from the Basket of Discourses and arranged them in chapters and produced the Udana. This is now not taken as literally true, but as an indication that a scholar of the first century put the finishing touches to the Dharmapada text of his particular school, the Sarvastivada, and fixed it in a definite form. The manuscript remains of this text stem from a variety of periods; one of the striking features that emerge from them is that readings of the earlier documents reveal a text that is less Sanskritised than the vulgate, which is based on the later manuscripts. The vulgate is so Sanskritised that it is often referred to as the Sanskrit Dharmapada.

From the foregoing, it should become clear that the reason why we have so many Dharmapada texts is that the different Buddhist schools that came into being in the course of the tradition’s history used their own specific linguistic format to transmit the sacred texts, including this particular text. Whether the texts of the different schools were redacted or translated from a single corpus in an “original language” of the Buddhist tradition is a vexing question to which no clear answer can be given. What has become clear from years of research is that none of the existing traditions can claim that its religious language is the language of the Buddha or that language in which the First Council was conducted. Whatever was the language of the First Council, it seems likely that Buddhists in the various localities of India transmitted the discourses that were accepted as genuine at the Council in their local languages. When schisms took place and sects or schools arose, each sect must necessarily have had a local centre that eventually became its “headquarters”. It is reasonable to assume that the language of that locality would have become the language of the school. But, in this role, the particular language seems to have been subjected to a process of “polishing”, in the course of which it must have lost a considerable part of its original vernacular character. This is why it is difficult to regard any of the existing text-collections as representative of the earliest language of the Buddhist tradition.

Although the Dharmapada texts of the different schools varied in language, size, and chapter arrangement, there were hardly any differences among them when it came to contents. Since the Dharmapadas (plural) were selections of verses from the discourses (and other such sources) that were made by monks of the early schools for the obvious purpose of advising Buddhists on how to lead the good life (to take dharma to the people), we should expect their contents to be somewhat circumscribed by that particular social requirement. That is probably why their different versions do not reflect any of the abstruse differences that characterise the various Buddhist schools. Instead, they reflect the basics of the teaching and what in it was thought to be most relevant to the day-to-day life of the people.

The work advises, explicitly and implicitly, that one must engage oneself in the process of learning dhamma. It asks,