The Dhammapada

The Dhammapada is a collection of sayings of the Buddha in verse form and one of the most widely read and best known Buddhist scriptures. The original version of the Dhammapada is in the Khuddaka Nikaya, a division of the Pali Canon of Theravada Buddhism. The title, Dhammapada, is a compound term composed of dhamma and pada, each word having a number of denotations and connotations. Generally, dhamma can refer to the Buddha's doctrine or an eternal truth or righteousness or all phenomena; and, at its root, pada means foot and thus by extension, especially in this context, means either path or verse or both. In Tamil language 'Padam' means subject, English translations of this text's title have used various combinations of these and related words.