Is it compulsory to accept Abhidhamma as a part of doctrine to be considered as Theravada?

[Ceisiwr]

Ok, what you are saying is Abhidhamma is another commentary. If you say so I have no objection to it.
For me Sutta Pitaka also a form of commentary. It is not Buddha's own words. It is j; just a compilation.

Kind of, although I’m not sure that commentary quite cuts it. It’s more a way of organising the teachings and knowledge contained within the suttas. Sujato once framed the mātikas, or matrixes, which are the core of the Abhidhamma as a sort of search engine for oral texts. An ancient Dhamma Google. That is to say if an ancient monk or nun wanted to look up an aspect of the Dhamma, as it were, they need only look to the appropriate matrix and follow it through, or ask those who knew it (via memory of course). The Abhidhamma systematically organises the teachings found in the suttas based on this matrix principle, and expands with further definitions for clarification (no different to what we do here). Sujato departs radically from other Abhidhammas in that he thinks the Dhamma has no underlying structure or core, and that all of the teachings were always and ever context specific. Still, even on this basis he can’t help but from an Abhidhamma of his own.

[SarathW]

Ok, what you are saying is Abhidhamma is another commentary. If you say so I have no objection to it.
For me Sutta Pitaka also a form of commentary. It is not Buddha's own words. It is j; just a compilation.

Kind of, although I’m not sure that commentary quite cuts it. It’s more a way of organising the teachings and knowledge contained within the suttas. Sujato once framed the mātikas, or matrixes, which are the core of the Abhidhamma as a sort of search engine for oral texts. An ancient Dhamma Google. That is to say if an ancient monk or nun wanted to look up an aspect of the Dhamma, as it were, they need only look to the appropriate matrix and follow it through, or ask those who knew it (via memory of course). The Abhidhamma systematically organises the teachings found in the suttas, and expands with further definitions for clarification (no different to what we do here). Sujato departs radically from other Abhidhammas in that he thinks the Dhamma has no underlying structure or core, and that all of the teachings were always and ever context specific. Still, even on this basis he can’t help but from an Abhidhamma of his own.

In which way his Sutta Central project is considered another form of Abhidhamma?
Sorry, I am still trying to understand what you say here.

[Ceisiwr]

In which way his Sutta Central project is considered another form of Abhidhamma?
Sorry, I am still trying to understand what you say here.

The EBT project is simply an attempt to arrive at suttas and Agamas, and so teachings, that are considered to be pre-sectarian. Once that is done you have to explain the teachings therein. They will need further explanation. For Sujato there is no underlying core or structure when it comes to the Dhamma. It’s all context specific, yet still he has to explain what the Dhamma is, what it’s terms mean and how at least some of the Dhamma is related to another part. To give an example Sujato doesn’t think that Nibbana is an existing dhamma. He’ll need to expand on why that is and what the implications are and how it connects to another part of the Dhamma. That is a form of Abhidhamma.

[Ceisiwr]

Sujato on the Abhidhamma (in general)

This is a really good point. It’s incredibly important that we don’t see the subsequent generations of Buddhists as mere losers who got everything wrong. That raises just too many problems; but more important, it’s not a compassionate or wise way of looking at things.

As one of the few people in the world who works pretty much full time with Pali and related texts, I am acutely conscious that much of what I do is “abhidhamma” in the original meaning of the word. That is, it’s doing stuff that’s “about the teachings”.

As just one example, yesterday we posted a major upgrade to our PTS dictionary, fixing hundreds of thousands of issues. Most of these are petty details, mere conventions and markup. Now, acting as a dictionary is one of the function of the old Abhidhamma (and in a different way, the commentaries). In fact, in their lists of terms and synonyms we could argue that they are the word’s first Thesaurus. The benefit of doing this is obvious; collect various terms, collate similar terms, and clarify the meaning of different terms in various contexts.

Now, these days that’s not very useful. Modern dictionaries are much more useful, and I can easily use search across the whole corpus to find what I want. But I can only do these things because of the “abhidhamma” work done by myself, other SC developers, and the countless scholars and volunteers on whose work we rely.

This is far from denying that there are major issues with the abhidhamma project in general, and the Theravadin Abhidhamma texts in particular. But to understand these we have to start by empathizing with and understanding their goals and methods.

Long ago I wrote The Mystique of the Abhidhamma, which I believe is the most humorous essay on Abhidhamma ever written. Of course, there’s not much competition; none, to be precise. The point of the article, as explained in the final paragraph, is that we can never understand Abhidhamma properly if we insist on worshiping it and making it into something that it quite obviously is not.

I find it frustrating that even today there are so many people following Burmese methods based on the assumption that everything in the Abhidhamma is true. It’s not, even in the canonical Abhidhamma; and almost everything taught as “abhidhamma” in fact stems from much later commentaries. We have thousands of meditators believing with complete conviction that they are seeing kalāpas and mind moments and the rest. But these things just don’t exist. And they were certainly never taught by the Buddha. How is this a path to non-delusion? If we’re unable to rise above denial regarding even the simple facts of history, how can we see subtle truths of the mind?

The problem is not so much the abhidhamma texts as such, it’s the role they’ve been pressed into by the community. If we see them as attempts to write a curriculum, to make dictionaries and concordances, to classify and clarify concepts, then they can be seen as valuable or not in so far as they achieve these goals. To force them to serve as a model of “absolute truth” is to disrespect the texts and their authors. This is not listening to the actual Abhidhamma, it’s worshiping a false idol.

https://discourse.suttacentral.net/t/th ... mma/3193/3

Naturally I disagree with him regarding the problems of the Theravada Abhidhamma, although I share his scepticism of the concept of kalapas (which is found in much later sub-commentaries). But I agree with his general overview of what the essence of the Abhidhamma is, which is why it’s, as I said, inescapable. What is different is the form that it takes.

To go back to something I said earlier, if you find something you disagree with in the Abhidhamma (or commentaries) try understanding why the Theras reached that conclusion. What problem did they see that they were addressing? Is it a valid problem? If so, does the explanation given answer it and so on. Do that before you outright reject the teaching or concept.

[DooDoot]

Abhdidhamma says:

Therein what is the cause of suffering (dukkhasamudayo)? Craving. This is called the cause of suffering.

Therein what is suffering? The remaining corruptions, the remaining unskilful dhammas, the three skilful roots that are objects of the defilements, the remaining skilful dhammas that are objects of the defilements, the resultants of skilful and unskilful dhammas that are objects of the defilements, whatever inoperative dhammas there are neither skilful nor unskilful nor the resultants of action, and all material qualities. This is called suffering.

https://suttacentral.net/vb4/en/thittila#pts-cs206

[DooDoot]

Abhidhamma says:

With ignorance as condition there is a (volitional) process, with a (volitional) process [singular] as condition: consciousness, with consciousness as condition: mind [but not rupa ], with mind as condition: the sixth sense sphere, with the sixth sense sphere as condition: contact, with contact as condition: feeling, with feeling as condition: craving, with craving as condition: attachment, with attachment as condition: continuation, with continuation as condition: birth, with birth as condition: ageing, death, and so there is an origination of this whole mass of suffering.

https://suttacentral.net/vb6/en/anandajoti#pts-cs243

With ignorance as condition there is a (volitional) process, also with a (volitional) process as condition there is ignorance, with a (volitional) process as condition: consciousness, also with consciousness as condition: a (volitional) process, with consciousness as condition: mind, also with mind as condition: consciousness, with mind as condition: the sixth sense sphere, also with the sixth sense sphere as condition: mind, with the sixth sense sphere as condition: contact, also with contact as condition: the sixth sense sphere, with contact as condition: feeling, also with feeling as condition: contact, with feeling as condition: craving, also with craving as condition: feeling, with craving as condition: attachment, with attachment as condition: craving, with attachment as condition: continuation, with continuation as condition: birth, with birth as condition: ageing, death, and so there is an origination of this whole mass of suffering.

https://suttacentral.net/vb6/en/anandajoti#pts-cs246

[asahi]

The topic title should add Pitaka to Abhidhamma to differentiate with the term Abhidhamma itself . One should point out the percentage of the correctness of Abhidhamma pitaka contents vs its incorrectness percentage .

[Ceisiwr]

Abhdidhamma says:

Therein what is the cause of suffering (dukkhasamudayo)? Craving. This is called the cause of suffering.

Therein what is suffering? The remaining corruptions, the remaining unskilful dhammas, the three skilful roots that are objects of the defilements, the remaining skilful dhammas that are objects of the defilements, the resultants of skilful and unskilful dhammas that are objects of the defilements, whatever inoperative dhammas there are neither skilful nor unskilful nor the resultants of action, and all material qualities. This is called suffering.

https://suttacentral.net/vb4/en/thittila#pts-cs206

Those dhammas are all classed under suffering, as per the 3 different types of dukkha.

[Ceisiwr]

Regarding the other Abhidhammas I believe forms of the Vibhaṅga, Puggalapaññatti and Dhātukathā can be found in the other schools thus suggesting an ancient common core.

[Ceisiwr]

The phenomenalist teachings coming out of Hillside Hermitage et al. is an Abhidhamma

viewtopic.php?f=13&t=40455&start=15

This should have read “phenomenological teachings”. Phenomenalism is a different thing. The Theravadin Abhidhamma is phenomenalist, which is in perfect accord with the Buddha’s empiricist epistemology.

[Dhammavamsa]

For one to begin studying Abhidhamma, which book should be read first?

Currently I have gone through Majjhima Nikaya, partial Anguttara Nikaya, and now Samyutta Nikaya just arrived my home today.

But I really interested to know more Abhidhamma Pitaka. Is Ven. Narada Thero's Abhidhammattha Sangaha book a good start?

I got Patisambhidamagga, Dhammasangani, Atthasalini, and Kathavathu soft copies. Any suggestion for reading sequence?

[BrokenBones]

...

I take that to mean nothing much at all. It’s amusing to hear you say that the texts are verbose. Try actually reading one. The great majority of it is free to access here: https://suttacentral.net/pitaka/abhidhamma

Why would I feed my mind with 'moments' of kalapas to stretch over 3 lives?

Is there 'Dhamma' in the Abhidhamma... undoubtedly.

Is it a trustworthy source of the Buddha's teachings... hardly.

I'm still waiting to of Sarwathw's readings of the Abhidhamma which apparently has more Dhamma than the suttas.

[Ceisiwr]

For one to begin studying Abhidhamma, which book should be read first?

Currently I have gone through Majjhima Nikaya, partial Anguttara Nikaya, and now Samyutta Nikaya just arrived my home today.

But I really interested to know more Abhidhamma Pitaka. Is Ven. Narada Thero's Abhidhammattha Sangaha book a good start?

I got Patisambhidamagga, Dhammasangani, Atthasalini, and Kathavathu soft copies. Any suggestion for reading sequence?

I would actually start with “The Theravada Abhidhamma: Inquiry Into the Nature of Conditioned Reality” and “The Buddhist Analysis of Matter” both by Y. Karunadasa. They are very good introductions. Regarding the texts themselves I would say start with the Vibangha and its commentary, then the Dhammasangini and its commentary then the Patthana, which can be a difficult read (this is where Karunadasa comes in handy). The Yamaka is more of a question and answers book for students, sort of teaching them how to debate (what answers are correct to different questions). It and the dhātukathā can be hard to read at times. The Kathāvatthu is simple enough and can be read at any time. The same for the Puggalapaññatti.

[Dweller]

Taking any stance towards Abhidhamma isn't compulsory to advance on the Path.

But bearing a grudge towards the other camp and debating in the way Buddha advised against could be detrimental.

[waryoffolly]

It would be good for people arguing against the commentaries to take a look at an example of the atthakatha. To me they seem much closer to the suttas than many modern commentarial works (ie modern books on Buddhism!).

Is this really so anti-dhamma?
https://www.bps.lk/olib/bp/bp212s_Bodhi ... seship.pdf

Also see here for other free commentary translations (you have to google the titles).
https://discourse.suttacentral.net/t/pl ... ions/16882