34 Facts About Five precepts

The Five precepts have been connected with utilitarianist, deontological and virtue approaches to ethics, though by 2017, such categorization by western terminology had mostly been abandoned by scholars.

The Five precepts have been compared with human rights because of their universal nature, and some scholars argue they can complement the concept of human rights.

Five precepts were common to the religious milieu of 6th-century BCE India, but the Buddha's focus on awareness through the fifth precept was unique.

In countries where Buddhism had to compete with other religions, such as China, the ritual of undertaking the five precepts developed into an initiation ceremony to become a Buddhist layperson.

The five precepts are part of the right speech, action and livelihood aspects of the Noble Eightfold Path, the core teaching of Buddhism.

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The five precepts have been described as social values that bring harmony to society, and breaches of the precepts described as antithetical to a harmonious society.

The five precepts are partly found in the teaching called the ten good courses of action, referred to in Theravada and Tibetan Buddhism .

Five precepts were part of Early Buddhism and are common to nearly all schools of Buddhism.

In Early Buddhism, the five precepts were regarded as an ethic of restraint, to restrain unwholesome tendencies and thereby purify one's being to attain enlightenment.

The five precepts were based on the pancasila, prohibitions for pre-Buddhist Brahmanic priests, which were adopted in many Indic religions around 6th century BCE.

The first four Buddhist Five precepts were nearly identical to these pancasila, but the fifth precept, the prohibition on intoxication, was new in Buddhism: the Buddha's emphasis on awareness was unique.

The Five precepts are seen as a preliminary condition for the higher development of the mind.

At a third stage in the texts, the Five precepts are actually mentioned together with the triple gem, as though they are part of it.

The Five precepts are often committed to by new followers as part of their installment, yet this is not very pronounced.

However, in some countries like China, where Buddhism was not the only religion, the Five precepts became an ordination ceremony to initiate laypeople into the Buddhist religion.

In China, the five precepts were introduced in the first centuries CE, both in their sravakayana and bodhisattva formats.

Format of the ceremony for taking the Five precepts occurs several times in the Chinese Buddhist Canon, in slightly different forms.

One formula of the Five precepts can be found in the Treatise on Taking Refuge and the Precepts :.

Similarly, in the Mula-Sarvastivada texts used in Tibetan Buddhism, the Five precepts are formulated such that one takes the Five precepts upon oneself for one's entire lifespan, following the examples of the enlightened disciples of the Buddha .

Five precepts can be found in many places in the Early Buddhist Texts.

The Five precepts are regarded as means to building good character, or as an expression of such character.

Precisely, the texts say that one should keep the Five precepts, adhering to the principle of comparing oneself with others:.

Ethicist Pinit Ratanakul argues that the compassion which motivates upholding the Five precepts comes from an understanding that all living beings are equal and of a nature that they are 'not-self' .

Researchers doing field studies in traditional Buddhist societies have found that the five precepts are generally considered demanding and challenging.

Yet, people do consider the Five precepts worth striving for, and do uphold them out of fear of bad karma and being reborn in hell, or because they believe in that the Buddha issued these rules, and that they therefore should be maintained.

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Anthropologist Melford Spiro found that Burmese Buddhists mostly upheld the Five precepts to avoid bad karma, as opposed to expecting to gain good karma.

Scholar of religion Richard Jones concludes that the moral motives of Buddhists in adhering to the Five precepts are based on the idea that renouncing self-service, ironically, serves oneself.

In East Asian Buddhism, the Five precepts are intrinsically connected with the initiation as a Buddhist lay person.

In East Asian Buddhism the vow of taking the Five precepts is considered a solemn matter, and it is not uncommon for lay people to undertake only the Five precepts that they are confident they can keep.

The act of taking a vow to keep the Five precepts is what makes it karmically effective: Spiro found that someone who did not violate the Five precepts, but did not have any intention to keep them either, was not believed to accrue any religious merit.

Five precepts therefore concluded that Buddhist ethical principles like the five precepts are similar to Western utilitarianism.

Keown has argued that the five precepts are very similar to human rights, with regard to subject matter and with regard to their universal nature.

Five precepts believes that human rights should be seen as a part of human development, in which one develops from moral discipline, to concentration and finally wisdom .

Five precepts argues that human beings do have natural rights from a Buddhist perspective, and refers to the attupanayika-dhamma, a teaching in which the Buddha prescribes a kind of golden rule of comparing oneself with others.