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Khuddaka Pā.tha, or "Lesser Readings," is one of the books of the Buddhist Scriptures. It is the first of the fifteen divisions of Khuddaka Nikāya, and immediately precedes Dhammapada. The text which I have adopted is that of a manuscript written and collated for me by a Singhalese priest of great learning. I have compared with it the Burmese manuscript belonging to the collection presented by Sir A. Phayre to the India Office Library. This, however, I found to contain numerous clerical and other errors, and it failed to supply me with a single corrected reading.
Khuddaka Pā.tha possesses a high authority in Ceylon. It is quoted in the Commentaries of Buddhaghosa, many of the examples in Sandhi Kappa and other grammatical works are drawn from it, and seven of its nine chapters are included in the course of homilies read at the Buddhist ceremony of Pirit. Three of the sútras, viz., Ma"ngala Sutta, Ratana Sutta, and Metta Sutta recur in Sutta Nipāta, the fifth division of Khuddaka Nikāya, and Paramattha Jotikā, Buddhaghosa's commentary on Sutta Nipāta, is also looked upon as the commentary of Khuddaka Pā.tha.
Khuddaka Pā.tha takes its name from its first four texts, which are very brief, and are termed Pā.thas in contradistinction to the Sútras, or sermons, which follow. The four Pā.thas, and the Ma"ngala, Ratana and Metta Sútras, are translated by Gogerly in his version of Pirit in the "Ceylon Friend" (June, July, and August, 1839).