ABC
Religious texts
Religious schools and traditions
Heavenly beings and deities
Legendary and historical figures
Legendary and real places
Symbols and art
Doctrines and rituals
- Awakening
- Community
- Compassion
- Craving
- Dependent origination
- Dharma
- Eightfold Path
- Emptiness
- Five Precepts
- Four Noble Truths
- Happiness
- Heavens and hells
- Impermanence
- Karma
- Koan
- Kung fu
- Meditation
- Merit
- Mindfulness
- Nirvana
- Non-self
- Om (mani padme hum)
- Parinirvana
- Pilgrimage sites
- Prajnaparamita
- Puja
- Pure lands
- Realms of existence
- Rebirth
- Recitation
- Renunciation
- Ritual
- Self
- Suffering
- Tales of rebirth
- Three Jewels
- Three-body doctrine
- Universal ruler
- Vesak
- Ye-dhamma formula
- Yoga
Lay Buddhist
Legendary and historical figures
The word ‘lay’ (Gr. laikos, ‘belonging to the people of God’) has its roots in Christian terminology. It denotes a member of a congregation who undertakes no religious functions, i.e. someone who is not a monk, a nun, or a priest. The Buddhist community is similarly comprised of religious specialists – monks, nuns, teachers, and great masters – as well as laypersons (Skt. upasaka/ upasika, ‘he/she sitting here’). The latter ‘seek refuge’ through recitation of the Three Jewels and agree to abide by the Five Precepts: do not kill, do not steal, do not lie, do not engage in sexual misconduct, and do not use intoxicants.