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The Buddha's teachings were brought forward by word of mouth for more than five centuries from the date of His parinibbana. For the first time during King Valagambahu's reign –circa 88 B.C. - in Ceylon (=Sinhalé) the scriptures were written down for posterity by Sinhala Arhants in an exceptionally wonderful phonetic Sinhala script. This was necessitated because the sounds of the original Pali discourses, which were verbally brought up thus far, had to be now laid down in script form. For this they evolved the Sinhala script of the day, to include all the phonetics involved in the original chanted form of the suttas. That which is known as the Sutta Pitaka, is what they wrote down then. If not for this great work the Buddhist scriptures will not be available today.
Read the Dhammapadaya (Click English on the drop down list to read in English)
Read the Dhammapadaya (Click English on the drop down list to read in English)
