Theravada practitioners make up about 25.2% of the Buddhist population, or nearly 130 million people.
TheravadaBuddhism is mostly practiced in Southeast Asian countries such as (Thailand, Myanmar, Laos, and Cambodia), but the large Theravada Buddhist population is in Sri Lanka in South Asia.
Theravada Buddhism emerge in 5th century.
• Theravada (“The Way of the Elders”) Buddhism became widespread in Sri Lanka in South Asia, and the Monk people introduced it in Burma (now Myanmar) in Southeast Asia. ;
• The major spread of Theravada Buddhism in Burma, because of King Anawrahta’s conversion during 11th C.E. ; • It became even more widespread in Cambodia
when the Thais invaded Angkor around 1431, and most Cambodians became followers of Theravada Buddhism.
• A major branch of religion, Theravada Buddhism (“school of eldermonk’ or school of the ancients”) or the “Southern School of Buddhism”
• draws on the collected teachings of the oldest recorded texts of Buddhism texts to become its central precept, the PaliCanon.
• This school claims to have preserved the original teachings of Siddhartha with pristine purity. Theravada
Buddhism has gained considerable followers in the West in modern times.
