For those of you who don't know, the Abhidhamma is a collection of teachings of which there is a debate about as to whether it is originally from the Buddha or whether it was added on later. The basic story around it is that during one three month period, the rainy season when monks and nuns stay in one place as they still do today, the Buddha decided to go and teach his mother. Or I could say the being who had been his mother, because she was dead and was reborn in a heaven realm. He went up to teach her every day and he taught her very high level philosophical and psychological type of teachings. Everyday then he would come back to earth and he would explain the teaching to, I believe it was, Sariputta who was a very wise enlightened monk. Sariputta could understand it, and then later, this was written down and is called the Abhidhamma.
Now it's something we don't teach and something we hardly have looked at. Because it's extremely intellectual, extremely philosophical, with a lot of psychological viewpoints, this or that. There does seem to be some things in it which might be of value, but for me, personally, when I tried to read it over 20 years ago, it was just too many words for me, it was just too much. It seemed like it was talking much more about the end of the road or the top of the mountain, although there were also parts that definitely talked about down on the ground. But for me it was too difficult and it got too confusing.
Now I mentioned that there is a debate as to whether it is an original teaching or not, and this can probably never be known unless we become enlightened, and can look back in time, so it will just stay a debate issue. And yet when I say that, whenever we have and hold onto the Kalama Sutta, then it doesn't really matter whether the Abhidhamma is a original teaching or not. It doesn't matter if the other parts of the scriptures are original or not. With the Kalama Sutta we always judge every teaching; we judge it, we look at it, we see if it is beneficial, we see if it is not. Whether somebody tells us it is original, whether somebody tells us it is not original, that doesn't matter.
The same issue comes up in another section of the overall teachings in Theravadin Buddhism called the Commentaries. Some of you have heard me mention about this, the Commentaries are another section which are definitely not straight from the Buddha, but they are commentaries supposedly written by enlightened people after the Buddha was dead, and they help to explain in more fullness what is written in the scriptures in short form. And some people like to argue whether the Commentaries are really from enlightened people or not, whether they should really be used with Buddhist teachings or not, yet we don't get into that argument, just the same way with the Abhidhamma, because we hold onto the Kalama Sutta. If we see something in the Commentaries that's of value, then we use it, if we see something that's not of value, then we leave it. Same thing with the Abhidhamma. If you decide to have a go and try to read the Abhidhamma, that's fine. But look and see if the teachings are practical and you can use them in your life. Whether they're actually beneficial and useful for you today in the very moment is very important.