Journal of Buddhist Ethics ISSN 1076-9005 http://www.buddhistethics.org/ Volume 16, 2009 The Bahudhātuka-sutta and its Parallels On Women’s Inabilities Anālayo Center for Buddhist Studies University of Hamburg and Dharma Drum Buddhist College, Taiwan Copyright Notice: Digital copies of this work may be made and distributed provided no change is made and no alteration is made to the content. Reproduction in any other format, with the exception of a single copy for private study, requires the written permission of the author. All enquiries to:
[email protected] The Bahudhātuka-sutta and its Parallels On Women’s Inabilities Anālayo * Abstract The present article offers a comparative study of the Bahudhātuka-sutta , based on a translation of one of its parallels found in the Madhyama-āgama preserved in Chinese translation. The study focuses in particular on the dictum that a woman can- not be a Buddha, which is absent from the Madhyama-āgama ver- sion. * Center for Buddhist Studies, University of Hamburg and Dharma Drum Buddhist College, Taiwan. 137 Journal of Buddhist Ethics Introduction According to early Buddhist thought, the ability to attain any of the four stages of awakening is independent of gender. An explicit endorsement of women’s abilities to reach awakening can be found in a discourse in the Saṃyutta-nikāya and its counterparts in two Saṃyukta-āgama collec- tions translated into Chinese, which allegorically refer to a set of whole- some qualities as a vehicle for approaching liberation. The three versions agree that by means of this vehicle the goal of liberation can be reached independent of whether the one who mounts the vehicle is a woman or a man.