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par for the Buddha: he redefines terms to a much higher standard

Alphabetical list of some important terms the Buddha redefined.


appamāda 🐘🐾‍: assiduity, diligence, heedfulness

pre Buddhist meaning: diligence, heedfulness

Buddha upgraded meaning: see 🐘🐾‍ for most sutta occurrences, especially SN 55.40, a stream enterer who doesn't attain arahantship this lifetime, doesn't practice 7 awakening factors all the time and have sati and samādhi all the time, is called negligent.


brahman: redefined as an Arahant. "That's not a Brahman. THIS is a brahman."

pre Buddhist meaning: one of the castes in India, the priest class.



metta: friendly-kindness, has absolutely no element of lust, romantic love.

Pre Buddhist: who knows exactly how the 4 brahmaviharas were in detail? But we do know that rebirth there for a non-buddhist would fall to lower realms on their next rebirth. And we also know beings there have no gender, don't breathe, don't have sexual reproduction, so Sujato's tainted "love" has no place in pre-Buddhist metta either. Probably pre-buddhist metta was a devotional emotion for a  god, or host of gods. 


Nāga: 'giant', now also includes 'arahant'

🔗📝 collection of notes on AN 6.43 


saddha: justifiable-trust

✅ earned-trust, justified-confidence, provisional-trust. See how saddha is earned in MN 95, and revoked if unjustified

MN 47

pre Buddhist meaning: perhaps something closer to the 'blind faith' that we typically see in many religions.




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