Abbreviations

The abbreviations follow the system we use on SuttaCentral. While we do not arbitrarily violate accepted scholarly custom, the constraints of our environment force us to do some things differently. For SuttaCentral, each abbreviation must be:

• Unique across the entire corpus;
• Case insensitive;
• Without special characters such as diacriticals;
• Usually two, hopefully no more than three, characters long.

While it may take some getting used to, the system is quite powerful. “Bi-Pj.1” is “Bhikkhunī Pārājika 1”, “Kd.3.2.1” is “section 2, subsection 1 of the third Khandhaka”, and so on. I have also written in full all of the rarely-used abbreviations, including almost all abbreviations for things outside the Pali canon. Table 1 has a list of abbreviations as used in this book.

Table 1: List of Abbreviations

BD	The Book of the Discipline
Vin	Pali edition of the Vinayapiṭaka of the Pali Text Society
Bu	Bhikkhu
Bi	Bhikkhunī
Pj	Pārājika
Ss	Saṅghādisesa
An	Aniyata
NP	Nissaggiya Pācittiya
Pc	Pācittiya
Pd	Pāṭidesanīya
Sk	Sekhiya
As	Adhikaraṇasamatha
Kd	Khandhaka
Prv	Pārivāra
DN	Dīgha Nikāya
MN	Majjhima Nikāya
SN	Saṃyutta Nikāya
AN	Aṅguttara Nikāya
KN	Khuddaka Nikāya
Kp	Khuddakapātha
Dhp	Dhammapada
Ud	Udāna
It	Itivuttaka
Snp	Sutta Nipāta
Vv	Vimānavatthu
Pv	Petavatthu
Thag	Theragāthā
Thig	Therīgāthā
Tha-ap	Thera-apadāna
Thi-ap	Therī-apadāna
Ja	Jātaka
Mnd	Mahāniddesa
Cnd	Cūḷaniddesa
Ps	Paṭisambhidhāmagga
Ne	Netti
Mil	Milindapañha
Ds	Dhammasaṅgaṇī
Vb	Vibhaṅga
Pp	Puggalapaññatti
Kv	Kathāvatthu
-a	-Aṭṭhakathā (Commentary)
Vism	Visuddhimagga
GS	Gradual Sayings (PTS translation of the Aṅguttara)
KS	Kindred Sayings (PTS translation of the Saṃyutta)

Note that in most references the “volume” is in Roman numerals. The exceptions are the main references, Vin and BD, where the automated linking of cross-references would be made more difficult using Roman numerals, and they are therefore in ordinary numerals. Thus Vin.2.34 means “Volume 2, page 34 of the PTS Pali edition of the Vinayapiṭaka”, while DN.i.45 means “Volume 1, page 45 of the PTS Pali edition of the Dīgha Nikāya”. Where such texts appear without Roman numerals, they indicate a sutta number; thus MN 34 means “the thirty-fourth discourse of the Majjhima Nikāya”.

In addition, I have eliminated most of the abbreviations used by Horner. She abbreviated “translated” as “transld.”, for example, and peppered liberally through the text are countless other standard and non-standard abbreviations that serve little purpose except to make a difficult text more difficult.