Glossary
Glossary
Key terms in plain English, with the Pali / Sanskrit where it matters.
- AnattāPali; Sanskrit: anātman.
- "Not-self." The teaching that no permanent, separate self can be found in any aspect of experience.
- AniccaPali; Sanskrit: anitya.
- "Impermanence." The teaching that all conditioned things change.
- Bodhi
- Awakening; the seeing the Buddha had under the tree. "Buddha" means "awakened one."
- DharmaSanskrit; Pali: dhamma.
- The Buddha’s teaching, and also "the way things are." The English spelling is used throughout this site.
- DukkhaPali; Sanskrit: duḥkha.
- Often translated "suffering," but more like "unease," "unsatisfactoriness," the inherent friction of conditioned existence.
- The Eightfold Path
- The Buddha’s prescription for ending suffering: Right View, Right Intention, Right Speech, Right Action, Right Livelihood, Right Effort, Right Mindfulness, Right Concentration.
- The Five AggregatesPali: pañcakkhandha.
- Body, feeling, perception, mental formations, consciousness. The five things you take to be "you," none of which is actually a self.
- The Four Noble Truths
- Suffering exists; suffering has a cause (craving); suffering can end; there is a path to ending it.
- KarmaSanskrit; Pali: kamma.
- Literally "action." The teaching that intentional actions have natural consequences.
- Mahāyāna
- "The great vehicle." A later branch of Buddhism dominant in East Asia and Tibet. The teachings on this site predate the Mahāyāna / Theravāda split.
- MettāPali.
- Loving-kindness, goodwill, friendliness. The subject of the fourth teaching on this site.
- NirvanaSanskrit; Pali: nibbāna.
- Literally "blowing out" — the extinction of craving, and the freedom from suffering it brings. Not a place; not annihilation.
- Pali
- The language in which the earliest Buddhist texts were preserved, closely related to what the Buddha himself likely spoke.
- SanghaPali / Sanskrit.
- The community of practitioners.
- SatipaṭṭhānaPali.
- "Foundations of mindfulness." The practice of mindful attention in four domains: body, feelings, mind, mental contents.
- SuttaPali; Sanskrit: sūtra.
- A discourse or talk attributed to the Buddha. The six teachings on this site are all suttas.
- TathāgataPali / Sanskrit.
- Literally "one who has thus gone" or "thus come." The Buddha’s term for himself.
- TheravādaPali.
- "The way of the elders." The school of Buddhism that preserved the Pali Canon, dominant in Sri Lanka and Southeast Asia.