Buddha quotes

Siddhattha Gotama (Pali), also: Siddhārtha Gautama (Sanskrit) was a spiritual teacher from ancient India and the founder of Buddhism and is known as Buddha. It is generally accepted by the majority of historians that he lived approximately from 563 BCE. to 483 BCE.

Quotes

Kalama Sutta: The Buddha's charter on free inquiry

• Do not believe in something because it is reported. Do not believe in something because it has been practiced by generations or becomes a tradition or part of a culture. Do not believe in something because a scripture says it is so. Do not believe in something believing a god has inspired it. Do not believe in something a teacher tells you to. Do not believe in something because the authorities say it is so. Do not believe in hearsay, rumor, speculative opinion, public opinion, or mere acceptance to logic and inference alone. Help yourself, accept as completely true only that which is praised by the wise and which you test for yourself and know to be good for yourself and others.

The Kalama Sutta, Anguttara Nikaya 3.65, Sutta Pitaka, Pali Canon

The Four Noble Truths is not suffering only

• I do not say that the breakthrough to the Four Noble Truths is accompanied by suffering or displeasure. Rather, the breakthrough to the Four Noble Truths is accompanied only by happiness and joy.

Samyutta Nikaya 56.35

Thoughts, actions

• Why do what you will regret? Why bring tears upon yourself? Do only what you do not regret, and fill yourself with joy.

Dhammapada, ch. 5

• All we are is the result of what we have thought, it is founded on our thoughts, it is made up of our thoughts. If a man speaks or acts with a pure thought, happiness follows him like a shadow that never leaves him.

Dhammapada, 1, 2

• Your worst enemy can not harm you as much as your own thoughts, unguarded. But once mastered, no one can help you as much, not even your father or your mother.

(Dh., ch. 3)

Science, space

• the infinite world spheres are incalculable

(KN, Buddhavamsa 1.64)

• There are thousands of suns, thousands of moons, thousands of continents.

Anguttara Nikaya 1.227

• When the average ignorant person makes an assertion that there is a Hell under the ocean (or other freezing or burning, fire ridden place), he is making a statement that is false and without basis. The word hell is a term for painful bodily sensations.

Samyutta Nikaya 36.4

• He recalls to mind his various temporary states in days gone by – one birth, or two or three or four or five births, 10 or 20, 30 or 50, a 100 or a 1,000 or a 100,000 births, through many cycles of cosmic contraction and cosmic expansion . . . Now there comes a time, when sooner or later, after the lapse of a long, long period of contraction, this world-system passes away. And when this happens beings have mostly been re-born in the World of Radiance, and there they dwell made of mind, feeding on joy, radiating light from themselves, traversing the air, dwelling in glory; and thus they remain for a long, long period of time. Now there comes also a time, friends, when sooner or later, this universe begins to re-evolve by expansion.

Brahmajala Sutta, Digha Nikaya

• there is no first beginning, no first beginning is knowable.

Samyutta Nikaya 15.1-2

• Bhikkhus, this samsara is without discoverable beginning. A first point is not discerned of beings roaming and wandering on hindered by ignorance and fettered by craving. There comes a time, bhikkhus, when the great oceans dry up and evaporates and no longer exists, when the earth burns up and perishes and no longer exists, but still I say, there is no making an end of suffering for those beings roaming and wandering on hindered by ignorance and fettered by craving.

Samyutta Nikaya 22.99

• The mind and body are dependent on each other the way two sheaves stand up by leaning against each other.

Samyutta Nikaya 2.14

The Golden Rule

• Now if I were to take the life of another; of one who wishes to live, who does not wish to die, who desires happiness and is averse to suffering; that would not be pleasing and agreeable to the other either. What is displeasing and disagreeable to me is displeasing and disagreeable to the other too. How can I inflict upon another what is displeasing and disagreeable to me? Having reflected thus, he himself abstains from the destruction of life, exhorts others to abstain from the destruction of life, and speaks in praise of abstinence from the destruction of life.

Samyutta Nikaya 55.7

• Avoid all evil, Cultivate the good, Purify your mind; this is the teaching of the Buddhas.

Dhammapada 183

• Hate never ceases by hatred, only love dispels hate. This is an ancient and timeless law.

Dhammapada 5

Ahimsa: Nonviolence

• He should not kill a living being, nor cause it to be killed, nor should he incite another to kill. Do not injure any being, either strong or weak, in the world.

Khuddaka Nikaya, Sutta Nipata, Dhammika Sutta

• Monks, one possessed of three qualities is put into Purgatory according to his actions. What three? One is himself a taker of life, encourages another to do the same and approves thereof. Monks, one possessed of three qualities is put into heaven according to his actions. What three? He himself abstains from taking life, encourages another to so abstain, and approves of such abstention.

Anguttara Nikaya, 3.16

• All beings tremble before danger, all fear death. When a man considers this, he does not kill or cause to kill. All beings fear before danger, life is dear to all. When a man considers this, he does not kill or cause to kill.

Dhammapada, 129-130

• What is the one thing, O Gotama, whose killing you approve? Having slain anger, one sleeps soundly; having slain anger, one does not sorrow; the killing of anger, with its poisoned root and honeyed tip: This is the killing the nobles ones praise, for having slain that, one does not sorrow.

Samyutta Nikaya, chapter 2

• . . . he abstains from killing living beings, exhorts others to abstain from killing living beings, and speaks in praise of the abstention from killing living beings.

Samyutta Nikaya 55.7

• Monks, possessing forty qualities one is cast into purgatory . . . he takes life himself, encourages another to do so, approves of taking life, and speaks in praise of thereof . . .

Anguttara Nikaya 10. 213

General teachings

• The wise and virtuous shine like a blazing fire. He who acquires his wealth in harmless ways like to a bee that honey gathers, riches mount up for him like ant hill's rapid growth. With wealth acquired this way, a layman fit for household life, in portions four divides his wealth: thus will he friendship win. One portion for his wants he uses, two portions on his business spends, the fourth for times of need he keeps.

Digha Nikaya 31, Sigalovada Sutta

• Bhikkhus, there are these four knots. What four? The bodily knot of covetousness, the bodily knot of ill will, the bodily knot of distorted grasp of rules and vows, the bodily knot of adherence to dogmatic assertion of truth.

Samyutta Nikaya 45.174

• Monks, these two slander the Tathagata. Which two? He who explains a discourse whose meaning needs to be inferred as one whose meaning has already been fully drawn out. And he who explains a discourse whose meaning has already been fully drawn out as one whose meaning needs to be inferred. These are two who slander the Tathagata.

Anguttara Nikaya 2.25

• Birth makes no Brahmin, nor non-Brahmin, makes; it is life‘s doing that mold the Brahmin true. Their lives mold farmers, tradesmen, merchants, and serfs. Their lives mold robbers, soldiers, chaplains, and kings. By birth is not one an out-caste. By birth is not one a Brahmin. By deeds is one an out-caste. By deeds is one a Brahmin.

Majjhima Nikaya 98, Vasettha Sutta 57-59

• Much though he recites the sacred texts, but acts not accordingly, that heedless man is like a cowherd who only counts the cows of others; he does not partake of the blessings of the holy life.

Dhammapada 19

• Little though he recites the sacred texts, but puts the Teaching into practice, forsaking lust, hatred, and delusion, with true wisdom and emancipated mind, clinging to nothing of this or any other world; he indeed partakes of the blessings of a holy life.

Dhammapada 20

• Remain with the Dhamma as an island, the Dhamma as your refuge, without anything else as a refuge.

Samyutta Nikaya 47.13 and also at Digha Nikaya 26