Buddhist origins and discussion of the Buddha’s teachings are amongst the most controversial and contested areas in the field. This bold and authoritative book tackles head-on some of the key questions regarding early Buddhism and its primary canon of precepts. Noting that the earliest texts in Pali, Sanskrit, and Chinese belong to different Buddhist schools, Roderick S. Bucknell addresses the development of these writings during the period of oral transmission between the Buddha’s death and their initial redaction in the first century bce. A meticulous comparative analysis reveals the likely original path of meditative practice applied and taught by Gotama. Fresh perspectives now emerge on both the Buddha himself and his enlightenment. Drawing on his own years of meditative experience as a Buddhist monk, the author offers here remarkable new interpretations of advanced practices of meditation, as well as of Buddhism itself. It is a landmark work in Buddhist studies.

The introductory chapter presents the problem posed for all Buddhists by the existence of differing versions of what the Buddha taught, preserved by different early schools of Buddhism, in different languages. Using specific examples, it shows how by focussing on these very textual discrepancies, the methodology of comparative analysis to be applied in this book can actually reveal what is most likely to have been the Buddha’s original teaching. A discussion follows of the assumptions underlying this methodology and how it might be applied to core components of Buddhist doctrine. The chapter concludes by showing how the structure of the book is defined by the fourth of the Buddha’s four noble truths, which specifies the path of practice to be followed to end suffering and attain enlightenment.

This chapter provides the historical context of “early Buddhism”, the roughly four centuries of oral transmission from the death of the Buddha until his teachings were written down for the first time. It recounts how Buddhist doctrine was memorised by chanting aloud, using such mnemonic devices as repetition and ordered lists; it also shows how errors in transmission could have been introduced. Such errors became more likely as Buddhism spread throughout the Indian sub-continent and beyond into Central Asia, the number of monasteries increased, and sectarian differences arose, with each school preserving its own canon. The importance of comparative textual analysis is demonstrated by reference to accounts in Pali, Sanskrit, and Chinese of the Buddha’s first sermon, the founding of the Buddhist Saṅgha (order of monks), and of the First Buddhist Council.

This chapter examines the best known and documented summary of the Buddha’s path to enlightenment, the noble eightfold path. This lists eight stages beginning with right view and ending with right concentration. It is pointed out, however, that this list stops short of the three associated meditative practices by means of which, according to the Buddha’s own account, he attained enlightenment. Discussion then turns to the much less well-known Tenfold Path, which does include the final stages of the “stepwise training”. How the two versions came to exist is explained by taking account of the historical context of and polemical differences within early Buddhism. This analysis suggests that an original eightfold path was first extended to ten stages through the addition of two initial stages, then later reduced to the canonical eight by excising the final two stages, which henceforth were taught only to the most advanced meditators.