Talk:Dhamma Practitioner

This page has been created due to the longstanding and problematic use of the word 'Buddhist'. Dhamma practioner is a word that is quite often used as a description of those who put the Buddha's teachings into practice and have confidence in them. In contrast the term 'Buddhist' is a western framing in light of familiar religions such as Christianity and often leads the average person to assume that 'Buddhist mean you believe in the Buddha', that is purely faith based which would be equivalent to 'faith follower'.

I will expand the article over time with references from the Pali Canon and elsewhere.

Unsourced claims
I've restored the tags re: references and original research, because without cites from reliable sources, much of the initial content does read like original research, and is given to unsubstantiated claims.

sometimes misleading term, Dhamma practitioner is seen by many as a more accurate description, In contrast the term 'Buddhist' is a relatively recent invention that some see as a Westernized framing, the term Dhamma Practitioner has been used by many teachers are vague and unsourced claims. The claim above of a longstanding and problematic use of the word 'Buddhist', as a rationale for article creation needs to be verified; are there reliable sources supporting the disagreement over the word's use? Please do add cites from reliable objective sources before removing the templates. Thanks. 99.149.84.135 (talk) 14:26, 17 August 2009 (UTC)


 * I have added a source by well respected monk Ajahn Chah where he uses the term. The article itself is going to cover the more expansive subject of classification schemes used for those on the Buddha's path. Since there are traditional classification schemes, I will reference them and expand on these. Objections to the term 'Buddhist' have indeed been raised before and I can find more sources. Dhamma practitioner is a general way of describing those who practice and is more of a way to better describe these traditional classifications.


 * The general distinction however can be said to be thus:


 * -You are not born as someone who is on the Buddha's path. Hence you are not born a dhamma practitioner. This is the main point. In all the classifications the Buddha gave for those 'on the path', all require that one chooses to practice or aquires confidence in the Buddha.


 * -Although many who call themselves Buddhist would say that if you are a Buddhist, you practice, you can also be 'born a Buddhist' as the term is commonly used. This is the case in many traditional countries and when worldwide 'Buddhist' numbers are counted. However, how many of these 'Buddhists' have chosen to practice as described by the Buddha is far less. And 'birth Buddhists' which is more a case of traditions find no mention in the original teachings, hence it is a problematic word. Possibly the argument can be made that some of these are 'faith followers', or 'conviction followers', although the argument of what qualifies as 'sufficient' faith and confidence in thw teachings to be a 'conviction follower' is debatable.


 * KnowledgeAndVision (talk) 19:57, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

I have added a large section on the two main classification schemes of 'Dhamma Practitioners', that is the 'seven types of individuals' and 'the eight types of individuals' as described in the Pali Canon.

KnowledgeAndVision (talk) 21:23, 17 August 2009 (UTC)


 * The article's statement that a phrase is always used in the Pali Canon is footnoted to one source in the Canon. Absurd. Peter jackson (talk) 10:00, 4 January 2010 (UTC)


 * There's also the question of neutrality: the term is used by some Buddhists to refer to themselves & anyone else who conforms to their ideas of what practising the dhamma means. Peter jackson (talk) 11:46, 5 January 2010 (UTC)