Santipada

While the abhid­hamma is presen­ted as being based on the Buddha’s ulti­mate dis­cern­ment of ‘mind & mat­ter’, in real­ity the clas­sical Theravādin abhid­hamma is a schol­astic philo­sophy which is little under­stood, and which, if examined crit­ic­ally, is full of inco­her­en­cies. Within Buddhist tra­di­tion, how­ever, the abhid­hamma is per­haps more sig­ni­fic­ant for its purely reli­gious or mys­tical sig­ni­fic­ance, rather than as a guide for prac­tice or understanding.