__NOTOC__ The Petavatthu () is a

Theravada Buddhist ''Theravāda'' () ( si, ථේරවාදය, my, ထေရဝါဒ, th, เถรวาท, km, ថេរវាទ, lo, ເຖຣະວາດ, pi, , ) is the most commonly accepted name of Buddhism's oldest existing school. The school' ...

scripture Religious texts, including scripture, are texts which various religions consider to be of central importance to their religious tradition. They differ from literature by being a compilation or discussion of beliefs, mythologies, ritual prac ...

, included in the Minor Collection (''Khuddaka Nikaya'') of the

Pali Canon The Pāli Canon is the standard collection of scriptures in the Theravada Buddhist tradition, as preserved in the Pāli language. It is the most complete extant early Buddhist canon. It derives mainly from the Tamrashatiya school. During th ...

's Sutta Pitaka. It ostensibly reports stories about and conversations among

the Buddha Siddhartha Gautama, most commonly referred to as the Buddha, was a wandering ascetic and religious teacher who lived in South Asia during the 6th or 5th century BCE and founded Buddhism. According to Buddhist tradition, he was born in Lu ...

and his disciples, and it dates to about 300BC at the earliest.. It is composed of 51 verse narratives describing specifically how the effects of bad acts can lead to rebirth into the unhappy world of

petas Preta ( sa, प्रेत, bo, ཡི་དྭགས་ ''yi dags''), also known as hungry ghost, is the Sanskrit name for a type of supernatural being described in Hinduism, Buddhism, Taoism, and Chinese folk religion as undergoing sufferin ...

(ghosts) in the doctrine of

kamma Kamma may refer to: *Kamma (caste), a caste or social group found largely in Southern India *Kamma, India, village in Punjab, India *The Pali and Ardhamagadhi term for karma *Bava Kamma, a traditional Jewish civil law procedure (1st volume of Nezi ...

. More importantly, it details how meritorious actions by the living can benefit such suffering beings. The scripture also includes stories of Maha Moggallāna's travels to the hungry ghost realm and his discussions with

hungry ghost Hungry ghost is a concept in Buddhism, and Chinese traditional religion, representing beings who are driven by intense emotional needs in an animalistic way. The terms ' literally "hungry ghost", are the Chinese translation of the term ''pret ...

s and his understanding of the realm. It also includes a story of how Sariputta rescued his mother from hell by making offerings to the monks as a form of merit-making to increase the chance of a hungry ghost being reborn as a higher being. The scripture gave prominence to the doctrine that giving alms to monks may benefit the ghosts of one's relatives seen in the Hungry Ghost Festival and ceremonies conducted in Cambodia, Sri Lanka, Thailand, and Laos. While regarded by scholars as a later text with relatively little doctrinal content or literary merit, the Petavatthu and a similar text, the

Vimānavatthu The Vimanavatthu (Vimāna-; abbreviated as "Vv") is a Theravada Buddhist scripture, the sixth book of the '' Khuddaka Nikaya'' in the Pali Canon. Its name in Pali means "Stories of the Vimana," usually translated as 'heavenly abodes' or 'divine ...

, became popular sources for sermons due to the narratives on the effects of kamma contained in their commentaries.

Legacy

The Sariputta story of the Petavatthu was adapted in 6th-century China to form the

Mahayana ''Mahāyāna'' (; "Great Vehicle") is a term for a broad group of Buddhist traditions, texts, philosophies, and practices. Mahāyāna Buddhism developed in India (c. 1st century BCE onwards) and is considered one of the three main existing bra ...

Yulanpen Sutra The Yulanpen Sutra, also known as the Ullambana Sutra (), is a Mahayana sutra concerning filial piety. It was translated from an Indic language (see History) and is found in Taisho 685 and Taisho 686 in Volume 16, the third volume of the Colle ...

, which makes Mulian (i.e., Maudgalyayana) its hero. Similar to its effect in

South South is one of the cardinal directions or Points of the compass, compass points. The direction is the opposite of north and is perpendicular to both east and west. Etymology The word ''south'' comes from Old English ''sūþ'', from earlier Pro ...

and

Southeast Asia Southeast Asia, also spelled South East Asia and South-East Asia, and also known as Southeastern Asia, South-eastern Asia or SEA, is the geographical United Nations geoscheme for Asia#South-eastern Asia, south-eastern region of Asia, consistin ...

, the dissemination of the story led to the spread of a

Ghost Festival The Ghost Festival, also known as the Zhongyuan Festival (traditional Chinese: 中元節; simplified Chinese: ) in Taoism and Yulanpen Festival () in Buddhism, is a traditional Taoist and Buddhist festival held in certain East Asian countrie ...

throughout the

Sinosphere The East Asian cultural sphere, also known as the Sinosphere, the Sinic world, the Sinitic world, the Chinese cultural sphere, the Chinese character sphere encompasses multiple countries in East Asia and Southeast Asia that were historically ...

.http://www.sacbc.org/docs/Thoughts%20on%20Obon.pdf A version of the Petavatthu's Maudgalyayana story separately became a Chinese legend or folk tale known as "

Mulian Rescues His Mother ''Mulian Rescues His Mother'' or ''Mulian Saves His Mother From Hell'' is a popular Chinese Buddhist tale first attested in a Dunhuang manuscript dating to the early 9th century CE. It is an elaboration of the canonical Yulanpen Sutra which w ...

Editions

* "Stories of the departed", tr Henry S. Gehman, in ''Minor Anthologies of the Pali Canon'', volume IV, 1942,

Pali Text Society The Pali Text Society is a text publication society founded in 1881 by Thomas William Rhys Davids "to foster and promote the study of Pāli texts". Pāli is the language in which the texts of the Theravada school of Buddhism are preserved. The Pā ...

, Bristol * In ''Peta-Stories'', tr U Ba Kyaw & Peter Masefield, 1980, Pali Text Society, Bristol; translation of the commentary, with the verses embedded; the PTS's preferred translation

References

Citations

Bibliography

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External links