Wise Buddhist Quotes & Sayings

One who is wise and disciplined, always kind and intelligent, humble and free from pride. One like this will be praised. — Gautama Buddha

The world is afflicted by death and decay. But the wise do not grieve, having realized the nature of the world. — Gautama Buddha

He who walks in the company of fools suffers much. Company with fools, as with an enemy, is always painful. Company with the wise is pleasure, like meeting with kinfolk. — Gautama Buddha

I have found that this is pretty radical notion for anyone who was raised with a strong Christian background. Within that religious tradition there is an emphasis on original sin, which dictates that we area bacically not good at all but must work for our salvation. Within the Buddhist tradition we are saying the opposite: actually you are basically good. You are basically wise. You are basically kind. You just need to discover that truth and develop confidence in it. — Lodro Rinzler

By three things the wise person may be known. What three? He sees a shortcoming as it is. When he sees it, he tries to correct it. And when another acknowledges a shortcoming, the wise one forgives it as he should. — Gautama Buddha

Like a beautiful flower, full of colour, but without scent, are wise words when spoken, but fruitless these words are when not carried out by the speaker. — Gautama Buddha

Through vigilance, restraint and control the wise will construct and island that no flood will overcome. — Gautama Buddha

I reached in experience the nirvana which is unborn, unrivalled, secure from attachment, undecaying and unstained. This condition is indeed reached by me which is deep, difficult to see, difficult to understand, tranquil, excellent, beyond the reach of mere logic, subtle, and to be realized only by the wise. — Gautama Buddha

There is no satisfying the senses, not even with a shower of money. "The senses are of slight pleasure and really suffering." When a wise man has realised this, he takes no pleasure, as a disciple of the Buddhas, even in the pleasures of heaven. Instead he takes pleasure in the elimination of craving. — Gautama Buddha

Love makes you wise. Love unites. Pain divides. Hate divides even more. Hate separates and brings us down to a very physical plane. Love elevates us to a plane of spirit. — Frederick Lenz

I know a wise Buddhist monk who, in a speech to his fellow countrymen, once said he'd love to know why someone who boasts that he is the cleverest, the strongest, the bravest or the most gifted man on earth is thought ridiculous and embarrassing, whereas if, instead of 'I', he says, 'we are the most intelligent, the strongest, the bravest and the most gifted people on earth', his fellow countrymen applaud enthusiastically and call him a patriot. For there is nothing patriotic about it. One can be attached to one's own country without needing to insist that the rest of the world's inhabitants are worthless. But as more and more people were taken in by this sort of nonsense, the menace to peace grew greater. — E.H. Gombrich

So in this case, Kalamas, don't go by reports, by legends, by traditions, by scripture, by logical conjecture, by inference, by analogies, by agreement through pondering views, by probability, or by the thought, 'This contemplative is our teacher.' When you know for yourselves that, 'These qualities are unskillful; these qualities are blameworthy; these qualities are criticized by the wise; these qualities, when adopted & carried out, lead to harm & to suffering' - then you should abandon them. — Gautama Buddha

When a wise man is advised of his errors, he will reflect on and improve his conduct. When his misconduct is pointed out, a foolish man will not only disregard the advice but rather repeat the same error. — Gautama Buddha

The point of the spiritual revolution is not to become a good Buddhist, but to become a wise and compassionate human being, to awaken from our life of complacency and ignorance and to be a buddha. — Noah Levine

I read of a Buddhist teacher who developed Alzheimer's. He had retired from teaching because his memory was unreliable, but he made one exception for a reunion of his former students. When he walked onto the stage, he forgot everything, even where he was and why. However, he was a skilled Buddhist and he simply began sharing his feelings with the crowd. He said, "I am anxious. I feel stupid. I feel scared and dumb. I am worried that I am wasting everyone's time. I am fearful. I am embarrassing myself." After a few minutes of this, he remembered his talk and proceeded without apology. The students were deeply moved, not only by his wise teachings, but also by how he handled his failings.
There is a Buddhist saying, "No resistance, no demons. — Mary Pipher

A person is not learned nor wise because he talks much; the person who is patient, free from hatred and fear, that person is called learned and wise. — Gautama Buddha

Drop by drop is the water pot filled. Likewise, the wise man, gathering it little by little, fills himself with good. — Gautama Buddha

The fool who knows his folly
Becomes wise by that fact.
But the fool who thinks he's wise -
He's called 'a fool' indeed! — Anonymous

NIRVANA- In the Buddhist religion, a state of pleasurable annihilation awarded to the wise, particularly to those wise enough to understand it. — Ambrose Bierce

What's that mean?" Eddie asked. "I hate it when you start up with your Zen Buddhist shit, Roland." "It means I don't know," Roland said. "Who is this man Zen Buddhist? Is he wise like me?" Eddie looked at Roland for a long, long time before deciding the gunslinger was making one of his rare jokes. "Ah, get outta here ... — Stephen King

The fool who thinks he is wise is just a fool. The fool who knows he is a fool is wise indeed. — Gautama Buddha

If you see an intelligent man who tells you where true treasures are to be found, who shows what is to be avoided, and administers reproofs,follow that wise man ; it will be better, not worse, for those who follow him. — Gautama Buddha

Meat is not agreeable to the wise: it has a nauseating odor, it causes a bad reputation, it is food for the carnivorous; I say this, Mahamati, it is not to be eaten. — Gautama Buddha

Let the wise one control his thoughts, for they are difficult to perceive, often elusive, and they rush about frantically: a mind well controlled achieves peace and happiness. — Gautama Buddha

There is no fire like passion
No crime like hatred,
No sorrow like separation,
No sickness like hunger,
And no joy like the joy of freedom. — Gautama Buddha

One should follow a man of wisdom who rebukes one for one's faults, as one would follow a guide to some buried treasure. To one who follows such a wise man, it will be an advantage and not a disadvantage. — Gautama Buddha

As irrigators lead water where they want, as archers make their arrows straight, as carpenters carve wood, the wise shape their minds. — Gautama Buddha

Though through all his life a fool associates with a wise man, he yet understands not the Dharma, as the spoon, the flavor of soup. — Gautama Buddha

Let them not do the slightest thing that the wise would later reprove. — Gautama Buddha

I'm helped by a gentle notion from Buddhist psychology, that there are "near enemies" to every great virtue - reactions that come from a place of care in us, and which feel right and good, but which subtly take us down an ineffectual path. Sorrow is a near enemy to compassion and to love. It is borne of sensitivity and feels like empathy. But it can paralyze and turn us back inside with a sense that we can't possibly make a difference. The wise Buddhist anthropologist and teacher Roshi Joan Halifax calls this a "pathological empathy" of our age. In the face of magnitudes of pain in the world that come to us in pictures immediate and raw, many of us care too much and see no evident place for our care to go. But compassion goes about finding the work that can be done. Love can't help but stay present — Krista Tippett

Irrigators channel waters; fletchers straighten arrows; carpenters bend wood; the wise master themselves. — Gautama Buddha

A wise man once told me- he's a muslim by the way- that he has more in common with a jew than he does a fanatic of his own religion. He has more in common with a rational, reasonable-minded Christian or a Buddhist or Hindu than he does with a fanatic of his own religion. In fact, he has more in common with a ration, reasonable-minded atheist than he does with a fanatic of his own religion — Gregory David Roberts

A fool who recognises his own ignorance is thereby in fact a wise man, but a fool who considers himself wise - that is what one really calls a fool. — Gautama Buddha

The good renounce everything. The pure don't babble about sensual desires. Whether touched by pleasure or pain, the wise show no change of temper. — Gautama Buddha

Therefore, do not eat meat which will cause terror among people, because it hinders the truth of emancipation; not to eat meat? this is the mark of the wise. — Gautama Buddha

Do not have as friends harmful people, the wise person does not associate with the worst of people. Have as friends virtuous people, the wise person associates with the best of people. — Gautama Buddha

Well-makers lead the water (wherever they like) ; fletchers bend the arrow ; carpenters bend a log of wood ; wise people fashion themselves. — Gautama Buddha

Fanaticism is the opposite of love,' I said, recalling one of Khaderbhai's lectures. A wise man once told me - he's a Muslim, by the way - that he has more in common with a rational, reasonable-minded Jew than he does with a fanatic from his own religion. He has more in common with a rational, reasonable-minded Christian or Buddhist or Hindu than he does with a fanatic from his own religion. In fact, he has more in common with a rational, reasonable-minded atheist than he does with a fanatic from his own religion. I agree with him, and I feel the same way. I also agree with Winston Churchill, who once defined a fanatic as someone who won't change his mind and can't change the subject. — Gregory David Roberts

"The world is afflicted with death and decay, therefore the wise do not grieve, knowing the terms of the world," says an old Buddhist teaching. In other words: Get used to it. — Elizabeth Gilbert

As an irrigator guides water to his fields, as an archer aims an arrow, as a carpenter carves wood, the wise shape their lives. — Gautama Buddha

The wise say that it is not an iron, wooden or fiber fetter which is a strong one, but the besotted hankering after trinkets, children and wives, that, say the wise, is the strong fetter. It drags one down, and loose as it feels, it is hard to break. Breaking this fetter, people renounce the world, free from longing and abandoning sensuality. — Gautama Buddha

If by leaving a small pleasure one sees a great pleasure, let a wise man leave the small pleasure, and look to the great. — Gautama Buddha

Even if a fool lived with a wise man all his life, he would still not recognise the truth, like a wooden spoon cannot recognise the flavour of the soup. — Gautama Buddha