translated by Bhikkhu Sujato
Khuddakapāṭha, "Basic Passages" or "Minor Readings," is the shortest and in traditional ordering the first book of the Khuddaka Nikāya, the "Minor Collection" that closes the Sutta Piṭaka. It is a small anthology of nine texts evidently gathered as an early recitation primer for new monastics: the Three Refuges, the ten training precepts, a meditation list of the body's thirty-two parts, a catechism of Buddhist numbers ("The Boy's Questions"), and five substantial verse suttas — the Maṅgala Sutta ("Blessings"), the Ratana Sutta ("Gems"), the Tirokuḍḍa Sutta ("Outside the Walls," on giving merit to departed relatives), the Nidhikaṇḍa Sutta ("A Treasure Trove," on merit as an imperishable treasury), and the Metta Sutta ("The Discourse on Love"), three of which remain among the most widely chanted texts in Theravada practice today.
This is Bhikkhu Sujato's translation, part of the same project that produced the four great Nikāyas already on this shelf: to render the Pali Canon into plain, accurate, modern English, dedicated to the public domain through a Creative Commons Zero (CC0) declaration. All nine texts are presented complete, in their traditional order.
Contents
- KP1 — The Three Refuges
- KP2 — The Ten Precepts
- KP3 — The Thirty-Two Parts of the Body
- KP4 — The Boy’s Questions
- KP5 — Blessings
- KP6 — Gems
- KP7 — Outside the Walls
- KP8 — A Treasure Trove
- KP9 — The Discourse on Love
KP1 — The Three Refuges
Homage to him, the blessed one, the perfected one, the fully awakened Buddha!
I take refuge in the Buddha,
I take refuge in the Teaching,
I take refuge in the Saṅgha.For the second time I take refuge in the Buddha,
for the second time I take refuge in the Teaching,
for the second time I take refuge in the Saṅgha.For the third time I take refuge in the Buddha,
for the third time I take refuge in the Teaching,
for the third time I take refuge in the Saṅgha.
KP2 — The Ten Precepts
I undertake the precept to refrain from killing living creatures.
I undertake the precept to refrain from stealing.
I undertake the precept to refrain from sexual activity.
I undertake the precept to refrain from lying.
I undertake the precept to refrain from intoxicants of beer, wine, and liquor.
I undertake the precept to refrain from food at the wrong time.
I undertake the precept to refrain from seeing shows of dancing, singing, and music.
I undertake the precept to refrain from attiring and adorning myself with garlands, fragrance, and makeup.
I undertake the precept to refrain from high and luxurious beds.
I undertake the precept to refrain from receiving gold and currency.
KP3 — The Thirty-Two Parts of the Body
“In this body there is head hair, body hair, nails, teeth, skin, flesh, sinews, bones, bone marrow, kidneys, heart, liver, diaphragm, spleen, lungs, intestines, mesentery, undigested food, feces, brain, bile, phlegm, pus, blood, sweat, fat, tears, grease, saliva, snot, synovial fluid, urine.”
KP4 — The Boy’s Questions
What is the one? All sentient beings are sustained by food.
What is the two? Name and form.
What is the three? Three feelings.
What is the four? Four noble truths.
What is the five? Five grasping aggregates.
What is the six? Six interior sense fields.
What is the seven? Seven awakening factors.
What is the eight? The noble eightfold path.
What is the nine? Nine abodes of sentient beings.
What is the ten? One endowed with ten factors is called “perfected”.
KP5 — Blessings
So I have heard. At one time the Buddha was staying near Sāvatthī in Jeta’s Grove, Anāthapiṇḍika’s monastery. Then, late at night, a glorious deity, lighting up the entire Jeta’s Grove, went up to the Buddha, bowed, and stood to one side. That deity addressed the Buddha in verse:
“Many gods and humans
have thought about blessings
desiring well-being:
declare the highest blessing.”“Not to fraternize with fools,
but to fraternize with the wise,
and honoring those worthy of honor:
this is the highest blessing.Living in a suitable region,
having made merit in the past,
being rightly resolved in oneself,
this is the highest blessing.Education and a craft,
discipline and training,
and well-spoken speech:
this is the highest blessing.Caring for mother and father,
kindness to children and partners,
and unstressful work:
this is the highest blessing.Giving and righteous conduct,
kindness to relatives,
blameless deeds:
this is the highest blessing.Desisting and abstaining from evil,
avoiding drinking liquor,
diligence in good qualities:
this is the highest blessing.Respect and placidity,
contentment and gratitude,
and timely listening to the teaching:
this is the highest blessing.Patience, being easy to admonish,
the sight of ascetics,
and timely discussion of the teaching:
this is the highest blessing.Fervor and chastity
seeing the noble truths,
and realization of extinguishment:
this is the highest blessing.Though touched by worldly conditions,
their mind does not tremble;
sorrowless, stainless, secure:
this is the highest blessing.Having completed these things,
undefeated everywhere;
everywhere they go in safety:
this is their highest blessing.”
KP6 — Gems
Whatever beings have gathered here,
on the ground or in the sky;
may beings all be of happy heart,
and listen carefully to what is said.So pay heed, all you beings,
have love for humankind,
who day and night bring offerings;
please protect them diligently.There’s no wealth this life or the next,
no sublime gem in the heavens,
that equals the Realized One.
This sublime gem is in the Buddha:
by this truth, may you be well!Ending, dispassion, the undying, the sublime,
attained by the Sakyan Sage immersed in samādhi;
there is nothing equal to that Dhamma.
This sublime gem is in the Dhamma:
by this truth, may you be well!The purity praised by the highest Buddha,
is said to be the “immersion with immediate fruit”;
no equal to that immersion is found.
This sublime gem is in the Dhamma:
by this truth, may you be well!The eight individual persons praised by the good
are the four pairs of the Holy One’s disciples;
they are worthy of religious donations,
what’s given to them is very fruitful.
This sublime gem is in the Saṅgha:
by this truth, may you be well!Dedicated to Gotama’s dispensation,
strong-minded, free of sense desire,
they’ve attained the goal, plunged into freedom from death,
and enjoy the quenching they’ve freely gained.
This sublime gem is in the Saṅgha:
by this truth, may you be well!As Indra’s pillar rooted in earth
is not shaken by the four winds,
I say a true person is like this,
who sees the noble truths in experience.
This sublime gem is in the Saṅgha:
by this truth, may you be well!Those who fathom the noble truths
taught by the one of deep wisdom,
do not take an eighth life,
even if they are hugely negligent.
This sublime gem is in the Saṅgha:
by this truth, may you be well!When they attain to vision
they give up three things:
substantialist view, doubt, and any
attachment to precepts and observances.They’re freed from the four places of loss,
and cannot do six things.
This sublime gem is in the Saṅgha:
by this truth, may you be well!Even if they do a bad deed
by body, speech, or mind,
they are unable to conceal it;
this, it’s said, is the inability of one who has seen the truth.
This sublime gem is in the Saṅgha:
by this truth, may you be well!Like a tall forest tree crowned with flowers
in the first month of summer;
that’s how he taught the superb Dhamma,
leading to extinguishment, the ultimate benefit.
This sublime gem is in the Buddha:
by this truth, may you be well!The superb, knower of the superb, giver of the superb, bringer of the superb;
taught the superb Dhamma supreme.
This sublime gem is in the Buddha:
by this truth, may you be well!The old is ended, nothing new is produced;
their minds have no desire for future rebirth.
Withered are the seeds, there’s no desire for growth,
those attentive ones are extinguished like this lamp.
This sublime gem is in the Saṅgha:
by this truth, may you be well!Whatever beings have gathered here,
on the ground or in the sky:
the Realized One is honored by gods and humans!
We bow to the Buddha! May you be safe!Whatever beings have gathered here,
on the ground or in the sky:
the Realized One is honored by gods and humans!
We bow to the Dhamma! May you be safe!Whatever beings have gathered here,
on the ground or in the sky:
the Realized One is honored by gods and humans!
We bow to the Saṅgha! May you be safe!
KP7 — Outside the Walls
Outside the walls they stand and wait,
at the junctions and the crossroads.
Returning to their former homes
they wait beside the door posts.But when lavish food and drink
of many kinds is set out,
no one remembers them at all,
because of those beings’s deeds.That’s why those who have compassion
give to their relatives
food and drink at the right time,
that’s clean, delicious, and suitable.“May this be for our relatives!
May our relatives be happy!”
Those ghosts who have gathered there,
the departed relatives who have comefor the lavish food and drink
gratefully express appreciation:
“May our relatives live long!
For those to whom we owe this gain,who have given honor to us,
it will not be fruitless for the donor.”
There is no farming there,
no cow pasture can be found;likewise there’s no trading,
and no commerce in gold coin.
The departed, the dead in that place
live on what is given here.Just as water that rains on high
flows down to the plains,
so too what is given here
aids the departed ghosts.Just as the rivers full
swell the ocean seas
so too what is given here
aids the departed ghosts.Thinking: “They gave to me, they did for me,
they were my family, friend, comrade”,
give offerings to departed kin,
remembering past deeds.For neither tears nor grief
or other lamentations
are of any use to the departed,
so long as their relatives stay like this.This offering that has been given,
well placed in the Saṅgha,
is for their lasting welfare,
and aids them right away.The relative’s duty has now been shown:
how high honor to departed is performed,
how the mendicants can be kept strong,
and how no little merit is produced by you.
KP8 — A Treasure Trove
A person stores away their savings
in a deep trove by the water’s edge:
“When need arises
it will be there to helpfree me from rulers if I am slandered,
or from bandits if harassed,
or to release me from debt,
or in case of famine or losses.”
What the world calls savings
get stored away for such reasons.But no matter how well stored away they are
in a deep pit by the water’s edge,
all their savings will fail
to aid them all the time.For perhaps those savings shift from there,
or they forget what marks the site,
or dragons make off with them,
or spirits carry them away,or unloved heirs
secretly unearth them.
When their merit is used up,
all of that will vanish.But by giving and morality,
restraint and self-control,
a woman or man
keeps their savings safe.At a shrine or with the Saṅgha,
with mother or father,
or else an elder sibling,those savings are kept safe,
they stay with you, undecaying.
We must go on leaving all behind,
only this you take when you go.You don’t have to share it with others,
no thief makes off with your savings.
An attentive one would make merit,
the savings that stay with you.Such savings grant every desire
of gods and humans too.
Whatever it is that they wish for
through this they have it all.Good looks, a sweet voice,
a good shape, and good appearance,
leadership and followers:
through this they have it all.Sovereignty of a local kingdom,
the happiness of a Wheel-Turning Monarch,
even kingship in the heavens:
through this they have it all.Human success,
heavenly delight,
attaining extinguishment:
through this they have it all.Relying on having good friends,
rational application of effort,
mastery of knowledge and freedom:
through this they have it all.Analytical knowledge, the liberations,
the perfections of the disciple,
the plane of an independent Buddha:
through this they have it all.This accomplishment in merit
is so very beneficial.
That’s why the attentive and the astute
praise the making of merit.
KP9 — The Discourse on Love
Those who are skilled in the meaning of scripture
should practice as follows to realize the state of peace.
Let them be capable and upright, very upright,
easy to speak to, gentle and humble;content and unburdensome,
unbusied, living lightly,
alert, with senses calmed,
courteous, not fawning on families.Let them not do the slightest thing
that others who are wise would blame.
May they be happy and safe!
May all beings be happy!Whatever living creatures there are
with not a one left out—
frail or firm, long or large,
medium, small, tiny or round,seen or unseen,
living far or near,
those who have been born and those about to be born—
may all beings be happy!Let none deceive another,
nor look down on anyone anywhere.
Though provoked or aggrieved,
let them not wish pain on each other.Even as a mother would protect with her life
her child, her only child,
so too for all creatures
unfold a boundless heart.With love for the whole world,
unfold a boundless heart:
above, below, all round,
unconstricted, without enmity or foe.When standing, walking, sitting,
or lying down while yet unweary,
keep this ever in mind;
for this, they say, is a divine meditation in this life.Avoiding harmful views,
virtuous, accomplished in insight,
with desire for sensual pleasures dispelled,
they never return to a womb again.
Colophon
Translated by Bhikkhu Sujato from the Pali, for SuttaCentral. Dedicated to the public domain via Creative Commons Zero (CC0 1.0) — see the source repository's license statement below.
Prepared for the Good Work Library by the New Tianmu Anglican Church with AI-assisted transcription and editorial work: the nine texts of the Khuddakapāṭha were assembled from SuttaCentral's bilara-data segment-JSON translation files, merged with the accompanying structural-markup JSON to reconstruct headings, paragraphs, and verse, via a deterministic conversion script adapted from the one built for the Dīgha, Majjhima, Saṁyutta, and Aṅguttara Nikāya editions; no wording was altered or paraphrased from the translation.
Source: suttacentral/bilara-data, published branch, commit 204a5c67e0efe49dba762e807d391e295f19bdc6 (2026-08-05), paths translation/en/sujato/sutta/kn/kp/, html/pli/ms/sutta/kn/kp/, and root/pli/ms/sutta/kn/kp/ (the root layer consulted only for titles and, in some editions, for the Pali-only structural headings noted in the introduction above). License: Creative Commons Zero (CC0), per the repository's LICENSE.md: "All translations created in Bilara and supported by SuttaCentral are dedicated to the Public Domain."
Prepared August 2026.
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