Pāli Canon
Mahayana practitioners may use the word "sangha" as a collective term for all Buddhists, but the Theravada Pāli Canon uses the word "pariṣā" (Sanskrit "pariṣad") for the larger Buddhist community—the monks, nuns, lay men, and lay women who have taken the Three Refuges—with a few exceptions reserving "sangha" for a its original use in the Pāli Canon—the ideal ("arya") and the conventional.