Which suttas should I study first? How an oral tradition works.

 

Re: What texts should I study first?

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Post by frank k » Mon Jan 23, 2023 10:32 am

Gami47 wrote: ↑Thu Dec 15, 2022 2:34 pm

This will give you a strong foundation.
https://lucid24.org/misc/raft/index.html

You shouldn't think of it like a college course where you go through an ordered series of suttas that you study, then move on and graduate from them.

Rather, the Dhamma contains not a large amount of important ideas, but you keep revisiting them and deepening your understanding of it.
The suttas were designed and composed for an oral tradition,
which means to get to most out of it, you should memorize the core ideas,
recite the instructions frequently, every day, think and ponder their meaning.
Then dots will start to connect, and you'll deepen your understanding contiuously over time.
Years later, decades later, you'll continue to discover deeper layers.