Buddhist canonical texts Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Buddhist canonical texts - Essay Example The latter are the various commentaries on canonical texts and other treatises on the Dharma, as well as collections of quotations, histories, grammars, etc. () However, it should be borne in mind that many divisions are arbitrary, and some texts fall between categories, or can be associated with more than one category. Canonical texts are in some way or other associated with Gautama, the historical Buddha. Different schools, however, are not always in agreement about which texts are canonical, and the various recessions of the Buddhist Canon contain widely varying numbers and types of texts. Broadly speaking, the texts come in three types: sutras (i.e. discourses), vinaya (relating to the rules of monastic discipline), and abhidharma (analytical texts). Together these three make up what is known in Sanskrit as the Tripitaka and in Pali as the Tipitaka. Both the sutras and the vinaya of every Buddhist school contain a huge variety of documents including discourses on the Dharma, commentaries on other teachings, cosmological and cosmogonical texts, stories of the Buddha's previous lives, and various lists (Skilton 50). The Theravada and other Nikaya schools believe, more or less literally, that these texts contain the actual words of the Buddha. The Theravada canon, also known as the Pali Canon after the language it was written in, contains some four million words. Later texts, such as the Mahayana Sutras, are also considered to be the word of the Buddha, but were transmitted either in secret, via lineages of mythical beings (such as the nagas), or came directly from other Buddhas or bodhisattvas. Some 600 Mahayana Sutras have survived in Sanskrit, or in Chinese and/or Tibetan translation. The most complete Mahayana Canon is in Chinese, though it was originally in Sanskrit. It contains texts from many strands of earlier tradition. Non or semi-canonical texts have been important from very early in Buddhism. Extensive commentaries exist in Pali for the Pali Canon and in Tibetan, Chinese and other East Asian Languages. Important examples of non-canonical texts are the Visuddhimagga, or Path of Purification, by Buddhaghosa, which is a compendium of Theravada teachings that include quotes from the Pali Canon. The Milinda Panha, or Questions of Milinda, is a popular condensation of the Dharma in the form of a dialogue between the Buddhist sage Nagasena and the Indo-Greek King Menander (Eddy 164). The treatise Awakening of Faith in the Mahayana (attributed by the faithful to Ashvaghosa) strongly influenced Mahayana doctrine and inspired numerous commentaries authored by early Chinese and Korean Buddhist teachers. Shantideva's Bodhicaryavatara has been influential in both Mahayana and Vajrayana, and his Shikshasamucaya contains references to texts which are no longer extant in any other form. The Platform Sutra of Huineng might be considered a semi-canonical text, it is one of a very few texts not thought to be spoken by the Buddha that has the label "sutra". One should note, however, that this distinction may be an artifact of translation: in the original Chinese, the Platform Sutra is a jing, a term that may be translated as "sutra", but is also applied to a variety of other classic texts, such as the Daodejing and the Shi Jing. In the Platform Sutra, Hui Neng gives an autobiographical account of his succession as Zen Patriarch, as well as teachings about Zen theory and practice. The Zen and Ch'an school in particular rely on non-canonical

Module 2 Case Assignment Study Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1250 words

Module 2 Assignment - Case Study Example CPI/Original Year CPI) * 100 = ((234-217)/217)*100 =7.834 Part III: 1. Unemployment Rate = (Number of people Unemployed / Number of people in the civilian labor force) * 100 = (2500/30000) * 100 = 8.33 % 2. Now 500 people have stopped looking for a job so they will not be counted, as unemployed neither they will be counted in the total labor force. So now unemployment rate is: ={(2500-500)/(30000-500)} * 100 =(2000/29500) * 100 =6.78% Part IV: 1. As we can see that the interest rates on the treasury bonds tends to increase over the years. The difference among the rates in the bonds is caused by Maturity Risk Premiums. This is because to invest for a longer period is relatively risky due to the uncertainty in the economic conditions. 2. The statement that ‘the liquidity premium requires that an asset can be sold both quickly and for fair market value’ is false. This is because the liquidity premium is paid to the investors as a security. Since, the bonds ‘cannot be easily converted to cash’. They are paid a premium to compensate for the illiquidity. 3. Inflation over the years = (Change in CPI / Original CPI) * 100 = ((105-102.5)/102.5)*100 = 2.439 % Therefore, annual inflation rate over the 3 years is 1.02439. Divide 1 by the number of years, so we get 1/3. Now, 1.02439 ^ (1/3) is 1.00806. And subtracting 1 from 1.00806 will give us the annual inflation rate, which is 0.008064 or 0.8064 %. Investors should require a 0.8064% inflation premium. 4. The yield curve will not have an upward slope but rather a flatter curve since the investors will not get high rates of interest on purchasing bonds as the risk of investing is zero and the value of their capital will remain the same. Part V: 1. As we compare the GDP levels of the US, Japan, Canada and the UK, we can see the trends of the rate of their GDP growth in the respective years from 2008 till present. During 2008, the GDP of all the countries increased by a similar figure that is aroun d 1 to 1.5 percent. During 2009 the trends changed for all countries as we can see however to varying extents. The GDP of all countries decreased. This is visible from the negative rate of growth as we can see where the GDP of Japan was highly affected and it fell by 9 percent. However, the GDP of UK fell by 6 percent, of US around 5 percent and 4 percent for Canada. After 2010, the economic situation seemed better and the economies started to recover where Japan hit the rate of almost 14 percent, from a negative rate of 9 % to a positive 5. Other countries GDP also increased with UK increasing least. In 2011, the trend seemed somewhat stable for the US and Canada. The rate decreased a little for the UK. However, it was very static in the case of Japan until 2012. 2. The prices were increasing persistently during 2008 in all the countries. However, inflation rate in the US and in the UK was highest of about 4 percent. The inflation rate in Canada was about 3 percent while in Japan i t was 2 percent. During 2009, because of the economic crisis prices actually decreased, as it is visible from the figure, with Japan facing deflation 2 percent and the US of about 1.75 percent. Canada faced deflation of about 1 percent. While the prices in the UK did not decrease, they rose at a lesser rate. Gradually prices started rising during 2010 until 2012, with UK facing highest rate of inflation, following the US and Canada at a similar pace. And Japan was still stuck in