The Teaching of Buddha

佛教聖典

“The Teaching of Buddha” is a collection of Shakyamuni Buddha's teachings. We have compiled this easy to understand book so that everyone can receive these teachings.

Shakyamuni, the founder of Buddhism reached enlightenment and attained the state of Buddhahood at thirty-five years of age. Before entering into Nirvana at the age of eighty, He gently shared his realization for forty-five years through various teachings that could be understood by anyone. After He passed away, his disciples assembled and examined the compilation of His teachings to pass them down to the succeeding generations. This compilation developed into the “sutra.”

These teachings first spread in the Pali language as Theravada Buddhism spread to Sri Lanka, Thailand, Myanmar and Southeast Asian. Meanwhile, the teaching based on Sanskrit translations spread as Mahayana Buddhism entered into the western regions of China, Tibet, China, Korea and Japan. The sutras transmitted to China from India came to Japan through Chinese (kanji) translations.

“The Teaching of Buddha” is a collection of Shakyamuni Buddha's teachings and not only contains the significant essence of the more than 5,000 sutras transmitted in Japan, but also includes selections from the Pali sutras transmitted to southern Asia. We have compiled these teachings into an easy to understand book so that everyone can receive these teachings, with or without any prior understanding of Buddhism.

For the last fifty years, it has been BDK's sincere wish to make “The Teaching of Buddha” book available to the whole world. To date, we have distributed over 8.4 million copies of the book to more than 60 countries and regions, and the book has been translated into 46 languages thus far.

Each language version of “The Teaching of Buddha” is downloadable now!