Indian Society for Buddhist Studies

Author(s): Prachya Vidyapeeth
Publisher: Prachya Vidyapeeth

Page 97

(82)
general traits of a friendship include similar interests, mutual respect and an attachment to each other, and in order to experience friendship, you need to have true friends. Friendship is often considered as a mutual and agreeable relationship between two individuals. It is believed that a person who finds a true friend has found a priceless treasure.
This ideal of the relevance and value of friendship in everyone's mundane life as well as spiritual progression is reiterated by the Buddha and mentioned as such in several Pali texts. The Mahamangala sutta, the Great Discourse on Blessings, is one of the most popular Pali-Buddhist devotional chants and as such, is included in the Paritta. The sutta begins when a beautiful deity having descended to earth in the stillness of the night, approaches the Buddha in the letavana and asks about the way to the highest blessings. The Buddha in his reply first of all states that the highest blessing comes from avoiding fools and associating with the wise (asevana ca balanam, panditanan ca sevana). The Buddha repeatedly stressed the value of good friendship (kalyanamitta) in the spiritual life. One's spiritual progress depends on the selection of friends and companions, who can have the most decisive impact upon one's personal destiny. The Anguttaranikāya contains many statements of the Buddha where he exhorted that he sees no other thing that is so much responsible for the arising of unwholesome qualities in a person as bad friendship, nothing so helpful for the arising of wholesome qualities as good friendship.
Again, he says that he sees no other external factor that leads to so much harm as bad friendship, and no other external factor that leads to so much benefit as good friendship. The Suttanipāta it is also mentioned that the Buddha states that it is through the influence of a good friend that a disciple is led along the Noble Eight fold Path to release from all suffering. The Singalovadasutta of the Dīghanikāya elaborates on various aspects of friendship. This paper will discuss on the various facets of friendship as explained in Tipițaka and its probable