Points of Controversy

18.3. Of the Buddha and Pity.

Controverted Point: That the Exalted Buddha felt no pity.

Theravādin: But this implies that neither did he feel love or sympathetic joy or equanimity. You deny. But could he have these and yet lack pity?

Your proposition implies also that he was ruthless. Yet you agree that the Exalted One was pitiful, kindly to the world, compassionate towards the world, and went about to do it good. No, did not the Exalted One win to the attainment of universal pity?

Uttarapāthakas: But if there was no passion (rāga) in the Exalted One, surely there was in him no compassion (karuṇā)?

The Points of Controversy, an English translation of the Pali Abhidhamma Kathāvatthu. Translated by Shwe Zan Aung and C.A.F. Rhys Davids. Published by Pali Text Society, 1915.

This SuttaCentral edition was prepared by Bhikkhu Sujato, assisted by Jatin Patel and team from Hi-Tech Outsourcing, in 2013–2014. It contains several minor changes in terminology, the intent of which was to bring the translation in line with more commonly accepted renderings, while eliminating some ambiguities and archaisms. These were particularly apparent in the verses, so I have newly translated most of these. In addition, the corrections listed on pp. lv–lvi of the original edition incorporated in the text. Much of the text is highly compressed, and is often a paraphrase rather than a translation. All notes and excerpts from the commentaries have been omitted, with the exception of the identification of schools, which is marked with each argument. These do not entail that these schools existed at the time of the Kathāvatthu’s composition.

In May 2013, this volume was kindly released by the Pali Text Society under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 licence (CC BY-NC 3.0). The current SuttaCentral edition, including all revisions, corrections, additions, and modifications, is released under the same terms.

Prepared for SuttaCentral by Bhikkhu Sujato.