Reddit mentions of The Numerical Discourses of the Buddha: A Complete Translation of the Anguttara Nikaya (The Teachings of the Buddha)

From Bhikkhu Bodhi (I think it's in the preface to the Anguttara Nikaya book):

> An intriguing divergence between two traditions [i.e., the Pali and Chinese canons] occurs in a discourse widely known as the Kālāma Sutta, which records the Buddha's advice to the people of Kesaputta. In contemporary Buddhist circles it has become almost de rigueur to regard the Kālāma Sutta as the essential Buddhist text, almost equal in importance to the discourse on the four noble truths. The sutta is held up as proof that the Buddha anticipated Western empiricism, free inquiry, and the scientific method, that he endorsed he personal determination of truth. Though until the late nineteenth century this sutta was just one small hill in mountain range of the Nikāyas, since the start of the twentieth century it has become one of the most commonly quoted Buddhist texts, offered as the key to convince those with modernist leanings that the Buddha was their forerunner. However, the Chinese parallel to the Kālāma Sutta, MĀ 16 (at T I 438b13-439c22), is quite different. Here the Buddha does not ask the Kālāmas to resolve their doubts by judging matters for themselves. Instead, he advises them to not give rise to doubt and perplexity and he tells them point blank: "You yourselves do not have pure wisdom with which to know whether there is an afterlife or not. You yourselves do not have pure wisdom to know which deeds are transgressions and which are not transgressions." He then explains to them the three unwholesome roots of kamma, how they lead to moral transgression, and the ten courses of wholesome kamma.

Actually, there's no evidence that the Buddha was a single person who existed. He could easily be a literary device used to tie the traditions of a monastic community together into a coherent whole. The critical difference between Buddhism and Christianity is that Buddhism doesn't depend on the Buddha. While the central concept of Christianity is that Christ came to save humans (and is apparently stuck with that job until the end of time), Buddhism is about a process to end suffering. You don't need a Buddha to practice Buddhism, any more than you need Isaac Newton to practice Physics. Gravity is gravity regardless of who discovered it. Buddhism is about a particular way of looking at and experiencing the world, not a supernatural person who is going to come and help you out.

Source: Bikkhu Bodhi's commentary in the Discourses of the Buddha series (Long, Middle Length, Numerical, and Connected), which is currently the best English translation of the Theravada Suttas. (The Suttas are just one of the three collections of texts in the Pali Canon. The other two are monastic rules called the Vinya, and collection of philosophical works known as the Abhidhamma.)

edit: typos and links and a little more about the Pali Canon.

Any one looking for the book -

https://kindle.amazon.com/work/the-numerical-discourses-buddha-ebook/B008YGGL7I/B009OFEYWM