Ānanda　阿難[陀] The Sanskrit name means “joy”. A cousin of the Buddha and one of his ten great disiples, well known as the one foremost in hearing the Buddha’s preaching. He attended to the Buddha for more than twenty years and committed all his sermons to memory. After the Buddha’s death, he recited those sermons, which were later compiled as a collection of sutras. He is the Buddha’s chief interlocutor in the Larger Sutra.