What Is the Difference between Theravāda and Hīnayāna?

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บรรเจิด ชวลิตเรืองฤทธิ์, ดร.

Abstract

What is the difference between Theravāda and Hīnayāna? It is one of my questions that I often bring up to people around me in Buddhist Studies. Many answer me with confidence: “They are the same. No difference. Hīnayāna is just the term used by Mahāyāna to call Theravāda Buddhism in a condescending way.”
However, it is not quite a perfect answer as actually we could use “Theravāda” and “Hīnayāna” as interchangeable terms only if in the context of Buddhism of the modern world. Fixed on such a general idea that “Theravāda and Hīnayāna are the same,” we risk distorting our understanding of the history of Buddhism, and how we relate to the past. And this is a main reason that encourages me raise this issue in the present
paper.
What is the difference between Theravāda and Hīnayāna? A clearcut answer is that Theravāda is one of the sects belonging to Hīnayāna Buddhism. Or a shorter explanation in mathematical terms: “Theravāda is
a subset of Hīnayāna.


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ชวลิตเรืองฤทธิ์ บรรเจิด. 2018. “What Is the Difference between Theravāda and Hīnayāna?”. Dhammadhara Journal of Buddhist Studies 1 (1):55-96. https://so01.tci-thaijo.org/index.php/dhammadhara/article/view/160689.
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