Buddhas and bodhisattvas represent exalted images of ethical perfection in Buddhism. In the midst of the kaleidoscopic complexity of Buddhist ethical thought and practice, the presence of buddhas and bodhisattvas serve as a universal focal point across traditions.

Buddhist ethics conceives of buddhas and bodhisattvas within a hierarchy of distinct categories of ethical actors. These categories are permeable and this hierarchy is not fixed; as ethical transformation occurs, over lifetimes or in some rare cases in a single lifetime, an actor's position is elevated (or potentially deescalated) in this ideational ordering of the ethical universe. It is a general truth that Buddhist traditions highly value the difference between ethical actors. While all beings have a future potential for enlightenment—and in some traditions an inherent capacity for buddhahood—the potential to live in the company of...