How Early Buddhism differs from Theravada: a checklist

by Bhikkhu Sujato

This is a handy summary of some major points of distinction between Early Buddhism and Theravada.

50 pages, Unknown Binding

Published January 1, 2022

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[...] “early Buddhist texts” [...] passed down to us in Pali, Chinese, Tibetan, and Sanskrit.

Theravada is the school of Buddhism established at the Mahāvihāra in Anuradhapura, Sri Lanka [...]. It regards the Pali Tipiṭaka alone as authoritative.

Theravada, like any religious tradition, has evolved and changed over the years. Many of these doctrines are codified in the Visuddhimagga and other commentaries of Buddhaghosa(5th century CE) [...].

[...] it’s about the beliefs and aspirations that good people have, not whether everyone lives up to them.

The aim of this list is to help students understand where the language and ideas of modern Theravada has diverged from the Suttas.

It is worth bearing in mind that certain modern forms of Buddhism, with their dismissal of rebirth, Nibbana, and the monastic Sangha, have diverged further from the Buddha’s teachings in a few decades than the traditions did in millennia.

Not-self is one of the Buddha’s cardinal doctrines, and all Buddhist schools teach it in one way or another. The Theravada particularly emphasized this teaching, and it seems they did so in competition with another of the ancient Buddhist schools, the Puggalavada.

The refutation of the Puggalavada is the first and longest of the debated points in the Abhidhamma book Kathāvatthu, which shows the significance ascribed by the Theravadins to this debate. It is likely that the core of this argument was established by none other than Moggaliputtatissa, the ideological father of the Theravada [...].

The Theravadin insistence on not-self, however, extends far beyond this one dialogue, and at times it borders on an anxiety or insecurity. The entire Abhidhamma project, with its relentless analysis and uncompromising refusal to truck with conventional notions of a “person”, is infused with this spirit.

Theravada makes much of the doctrine of the “two truths”, conventional (sammutisacca) and ultimate (paramatthasacca). Conventional truth is the domain of such ultimately unreal notions like “persons”, “nations”, and the like, while the ultimate truth deals with the fundamental phenomena of existence (dhammas). This distinction applies both to the expression of the truth—where the Suttas are supposed to deal with conventional truth, while the Abhidhamma deals with ultimate truth [...] No such distinction is found in the EBTs.

When the term paramattha appears in the EBTs, it does not mean “ultimate meaning” or “ultimate reality” but “ultimate goal”, and is a word for Nibbana.

The Abhidhamma texts serve many purposes, one of which is to gather the different terms and phrases found throughout the Suttas and show where they are equivalent and where they differ. While this is handy, it sometimes yields awkward and ill-fitting results, as it loses the nuances of the contexts in which the ideas are used.

While the Suttas are typically set in physical locations like Sāvatthī or Rājagaha, the Theravada tradition holds that the Abhidhamma-piṭaka was taught by the Buddha to his deceased mother in Tusita heaven, after which he would return to earth and repeat the lessons to Venerable Sāriputta.
This account is rejected by international scholars.

Note that abhidhamma itself is a problematic term, as in Theravada it rarely refers directly to the texts of the Abhidhammapiṭaka, but rather to the evolved and systematized interpretations in the commentaries and later texts such as the Abhidhammatthasaṅgaha. I myself was first taught directly from a modern summary of the Abhidhammatthasaṅgaha [...].

To question elders is, among some Theravadins, regarded as an inherent sign of spiritual malaise and ingratitude.
The method of learning in the EBTs is much more based on dialogue, on question and answer, and on personal discovery.

Modern Theravada is highly invested in specific meditation methods, which all claim to be both authentic and effective. These build off the detailed descriptions of meditation methods found in the Visuddhimagga, which gives the most detailed and comprehensive set of practical meditation guidelines found in any ancient book. [...]
The EBTs discuss the particulars of meditation in much less detail. Generally, they give an outline of the practice and its goals, while focusing more on the context and meaning of the practice rather than the mechanics of the method. The Buddha would typically teach a wide range of contemplative practices, and meditators would learn how to apply them in their own cases.
In this case, I think the Visuddhimagga is, for the most part, simply expanding and explaining what is found in the EBTs, but it can tend to an over-emphasis on getting the correct method, rather than being aware of the context and purpose of the meditation.

The intensive meditation retreat is a defining characteristic of the modern Theravada meditation movement. Popularized by the great vipassana schools of Myanmar, it aims to give lay practitioners the chance to realize deep meditations that traditionally would be considered mainly for monastics.
The EBTs contain no notion of such an intensive meditation retreat for lay folk. Rather, the normal practice for dedicated lay folk was to take one day a week, undertake the eight precepts, and devote themselves as best they could to Dhamma and meditation.

Once you instill this value in people’s minds, the focus tends to shi昀t from “what can I let go of ” to “have I made it yet?”

Devotional practices provided an emotional support and context, but were not an end in themselves.
This contrast is never clearer than when comparing the Thera- and Therī-gāthā with their later counterparts, the Thera- and Therī-apadāna.

Theravada, like all modern schools of Buddhism, teaches about the bodhisatta, the “Buddha-to-be” who develops his spiritual qualities over countless lifetimes out of compassion for all beings, with the aim of achieving Buddhahood. The Bodhisatta is said to have made a vow long ago under a previous Buddha.
In the EBTs we find no such idea. The term bodhisatta usually describes young Siddhattha after leaving home and in the process of striving for awakening.

Rather than the usual sense of “enlightenment being” (Sanskrit: bodhisattva), it would seem a more relevant sense would be “one striving for awakening” (Sanskrit: bodhiśakta). These two words have different forms in Sanskrit, but are the same in Pali (bodhisatta).
The clear sense of the EBTs is that what characterized the young aspirant was his total dedication to awakening in this life. In addition, compassion is never mentioned as part of his motivation for awakening [...].

As well as referring to the monastic community, the Buddha used the word Sangha to refer to the community of enlightened disciples, i.e. the four persons on the paths and fruits.

Within all sects and traditions of Buddhism, there are those who practice with sincerity and compassion, and those driven by greed and conceit. So long as we have the opportunity to let go of the unwholesome and develop the wholesome, we can grow in the Dhamma wherever we are.

For example, the Vinaya says that a monk must not sexually grope a woman with a lustful mind. Modern Theravada holds that a monk, regardless of their mental state, can under no circumstances touch a woman.

The Vinaya contains no concept of an ordination lineage. Ordination into the Sangha is designed to facilitate proper support and education for the new student, and is not a quasi-magical initiation. No order of Sangha alive today can prove that its own ordination lineage is “valid” according to its own standards; the historical records simply don’t exist.

In Sri Lanka, the mainstream Siam Nikaya performs ordination according to caste, which, it should hardly need saying, goes against everything the Buddha said on the topic of caste.

The relationship to seniority is one of respect, not command. Obviously junior Sangha members are expected to listen to the advice and guidance of the seniors, and normally would follow that. However there is no expectation that they must always follow it, and no punishment or other consequences for disobedience.

There is no concept of an abbot in the Vinaya. Decisions are made by the Sangha as a whole in accordance with the Dhamma-Vinaya.

In Thailand, the governing council is appointed by the King, and then it appoints preceptors, who are the only Sangha members legally empowered to perform ordination.

The mere use of money is, however, perhaps less significant than the use to which it is put. It is one thing to have a bit of cash for catching a bus or buying a book, and quite another to accumulate a large collection of antique cars. And it is quite possible to technically keep the rules about money while holding sway over vast resources.

The meaning of anumodanā is not “blessing” but “rejoicing after”. It acts as a reminder, when doing good, to be happy at the good deeds of oneself and others.

One of the first bits of Pali that you will hear is the anumodanā [...] chant by the monastics at the meal offering. These days we often use a Pali verbal form that ends in -tu. This is the imperative form, which conveys the sense, “may it be”. For example, bhavatu sabbamaṅgalaṁ, rakkhantu sabbadevatā “may you have all fortune, may the gods all protect you”. The sense is that the Saṅgha, by giving the anumodanā, grants a blessing to the lay community.
But these anumodanā verses are late. In the EBTs, the Buddha himself gave the anumodanā, and in these early forms we find, not the imperative -tu but the indicative -ti, conveying the sense “it is”. Such verses are concerned not with giving a blessing, but with teaching cause and effect. If you do this good deed of generosity, then the following will happen. Not because of the anumodanā given by the Sangha, but because of the power of your own good deeds.

Thus saṅkhāra in the five aggregates has the same meaning it does in dependent origination and elsewhere: volition. It is the identification of the self with the will: “I am the decider”.

There is a common sequence of phenomena in the EBTs: what is seen, heard, thought (muta), and cognized. [...] Muta is, however, the past participle of maññati (“thought”), and it always has this meaning in the EBTs.
This set of phenomena is derived from the Upanishads.

The root meaning of the term kasiṇa, however, is “universal” or “totality” and in the EBTs it is always used in this way. It is a description of a state of samādhi, not an object used to gain samādhi.

Nimitta is rather a curious term that straddles the range of a “sign, hint, indication” that something is to come, and the “cause” of that thing. [...] the nimitta of the eightfold path is right view.
In meditation, nimitta refers to a certain quality or aspect of experience which, when attended to, promotes the growth of similar or related qualities. Thus paying attention to the “sign of beauty” (subhanimitta) gives rise to lust, while the “basis of samādhi” (samādhinimitta) is the four kinds of mindfulness meditation, i.e. the practices that lead to samādhi.

The EBTs define nāma as “feeling, perception, intention, contact, and attention”, thus specifically excluding consciousness.

The purpose of the teaching of kamma is to show us that harmful choices have consequences in this life or the future. That does not, however, mean that all harmful consequences are caused by kamma.

The EBTs say that making poor ethical choices will create conditions of suffering in the next life. Normally this is talked about in terms of the realm into which one will be reborn. Now, rebirth in the human realm is always a result of good kamma, but nevertheless, the EBTs sometimes talk about experiences of suffering in the human realm as a result of kamma. These include poverty, health, status, intelligence, and beauty, but do not include gender or sexuality.

One who “enters the stream” is one who has completed all eight factors of the noble eightfold path, including jhānas.

Modern Theravada, especially the 20th century Vipassana schools, emphasize the development of what they call “samādhi” in various forms that are not found in the EBTs.
[...] “Threshold” (upacāra) samādhi is a grace period immediately before jhāna, where the mind is free of hindrances but not yet fully absorbed. It is sometimes extended to cover any state outside jhāna and free of hindrances.

As Ledi Sayadaw, perhaps the most influential founder of modern Theravada [...].

One of the meditations found in all forms of Buddhism is the contemplation of asubha, the “ugliness” of the body. It is intended to develop a sense of detachment from the body, so that we are no longer infatuated by it.
In the EBTs, this is done by contemplating one’s own body (imameva kāyo), or by comparing one’s own body with another’s, typically a decomposing corpse, in the understanding that “this body is also of that same nature”. [...]
Later Buddhism, including Theravada, commonly objectified the external object of revulsion as a woman’s body, and focussed the practice on overcoming sexual desire among monks. While overcoming sexual desire is part of the practice from the beginning, it was originally by seeing the nature of one’s own body, not by externalizing the ugliness into the bodies of women.

In this case, it seems the majority got it right, for there are a number of passages in the Suttas that clearly speak of a process between one life and another. For example, certain nonreturners [...] are said to die while not fully enlightened, and to realize Nibbana “inbetween” before taking rebirth.

For the EBTs, rebirth is always determined by some act of moral significance: giving, undertaking precepts, having insight into the truth.

He spoke of the “present” (paccuppanna), which is a more general notion, not tied to a specific momentary theory of time like the “present moment” (paccuppannakkhaṇa).

What matters is not seeing a particular vision of “ultimate reality”, but letting go of the idea of permanence.

This is especially common when speaking of the sixth sense base, that of which the mind is aware. In the EBTs this is dhamma, in modern Theravada it is often dhammārammaṇa, translated as “mind object”.
However, ārammaṇa is never found in the sense of “object” in the EBTs. It is always used in the sense of “reliance, support”. Nor is there any other term used in this way; I translated the entire four Pali nikāyas without ever once using the concept of a “mind object”.

There is no historical evidence that any of the relics worshipped today have any real connection to the Buddha or his disciples, with the exception of a very few relics that have been unearthed in 20th century archeological digs, such as the Buddha relics of Kapilavatthu at the Delhi Museum, or those of Sariputta and Moggallana at the Maha Bodhi Society.

But the keeping and worshiping of relics was not part of the Buddha’s teachings. This is, in fact, one of the reasons we know the teachings of the EBTs are reliable. Despite the fact that the traditions very quickly adopted the worship of relics, they did not attempt to justify this practice by altering or adding any texts to the early canon. Rather, they created new texts to authorize the new practices; or at most, they added easily-identified addenda to older texts, such as the closing verses of the Mahaparinibbana Sutta.

The early tradition symbolized the Buddha with the Bodhi tree, an empty seat, a stupa, or a footprint.

In this case, the EBTs give a fairly extensive set of interpretations for tathāgata, for example, “as he says, so he does”. The overall sense is of one who speaks and acts in accordance with his realization of the truth, which fits the translation “the Realized One”.

Tradition tells us that Siddhattha was motivated to go forth by the unexpected sight of four signs, from which his father had tried to hide him: an old man, a sick man, a corpse, and a renunciate.
The EBTs, rather, tell this story of the Buddha Vipassī, set in a legendary time far in the past. Our Buddha of the present gave a similar motivation for going forth—to seek an escape from rebirth, old age, and death—but without the dramatic narrative of the four signs. In the overlooked Attadaṇḍa Sutta, he further explained that he went forth a昀ter seeing the strife and violent conflict in the world.