Format. Each Part title carries a parenthetical with the canonical language(s); Pāli-canonical Parts (I–XI) additionally tag the doctrinal stratum (e.g., EBT, Abhi. + Theravāda comm.). In Pāli-canonical Parts (I–XI), headwords are Pāli with the Sanskrit form in parentheses — e.g. diṭṭhi (Skt: dṛṣṭi), or (Skt: same) when IAST-identical. In Sanskrit-tradition Parts (XII–XIV), the Sanskrit form is the headword; a Pāli cognate is parenthesized only when it carries parallel doctrinal use. Non-Indic Parts (XV) use the standard transliteration with the original script where useful. Terms whose stratum diverges from the Part default carry an inline stratum tag after the headword. Entries give brief glosses and rendering-notes rather than full prose definitions; longer def-flags surface contested scholarship or multi-sense terms.
Abbreviations. Canonical: DN / MN / SN / AN — the four main Nikāyas (Dīgha / Majjhima / Saṃyutta / Aṅguttara); Sn — Sutta Nipāta; Dhp — Dhammapada; Itiv. — Itivuttaka; Ud. — Udāna; Vin. — Vinaya. Commentarial / Abhidhamma: Vism — Visuddhimagga; Abhi. — Abhidhamma. Dictionaries: PED — PTS Pali-English Dictionary; DPD — Digital Pali Dictionary; MW — Monier-Williams Sanskrit-English Dictionary; Apte — Apte Practical Sanskrit-English Dictionary.
Part I — Earliest Stratum (Pāli; Aṭṭhakavagga / Pārāyanavagga)
Earliest stratum within the Pāli canon — often treated as among the earliest recoverable layers of Buddhist literature. Direct soteriology of dropping taṇhā / upādāna / diṭṭhi, prior to the systematic lists. Flag here any term whose earliest clear attestation is in the Aṭṭhakavagga / Pārāyanavagga / parts of Sutta Nipāta.
What is to be relinquished:
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diṭṭhi (Skt: dṛṣṭi) — view, position.
def-flag: treated here in its earliest-stratum sense as “view/position to be dropped”; the technical sammā-diṭṭhi usage belongs under VIII.a, and
sakkāya-diṭṭhi(identity-view, fetter 1) at VIII.g picks up the negative-view-to-be-abandoned sense in a later technical key. -
upādāna (Skt: same) — clinging, grasping; selfing, self-making (modern contemplative dharma teaching — picking up the reflexive “taking-for-oneself” force of upa + ā + √dā); “fuel, sustenance” (PED’s material-support sense). Lit. “taking up.” Also appears in VII.a as
upādāna(DO link 9); flagged here because the Aṭṭhakavagga treats non-clinging as the whole soteriology. -
taṇhā (Skt: tṛṣṇā) — craving; lit. “thirst” (cognate with English thirst via PIE *ters-). Also appears in VII.a as
taṇhā(DO link 8); flagged here for the same reason.def-flag: the standard formula at SN 56.11 characterizes taṇhā by three descriptors: its affective signature (
nandī-rāga, “delight-and-lust”), its roving activity (delighting here and there in objects), and its function (giving rise to renewed becoming). Aversion is handled separately:dosa(root, VI.f),paṭigha(reactive moment, VIII.g fetter 5),vyāpāda(intentional disposition, III.b hindrance). The split is soteriologically load-bearing — taṇhā is treated as the DO/4NT engine of renewed becoming; aversion is analyzed throughdosa,paṭigha,vyāpāda.Mettā/upekkhāare the primary antidotes to ill-will and reactive aversion (heart-cultivation);yathābhūtaṃ ñāṇadassanais the primary undoing of craving (wisdom-cultivation). Final eradication for both, though, is path-insight: the fetter-architecture haskāma-rāga(4) andpaṭigha(5) drop together at 3rd path, but taṇhā extends throughrūpa-rāga/arūpa-rāga(6, 7) — no parallel subtle-aversion cluster.Vibhava-taṇhā(“craving for non-becoming”) is structurally a craving with non-existence as object, not aversion-to-existence (Bodhi, Anālayo). The “craving / aversion” framing in modern insight-pedagogy (Burmese Mahāsi noting, Goenka’s “craving and aversion”; popularized via IMS — Goldstein, Salzberg, Brach) unifies pull and push as twin dukkha-movements — useful entry-level synthesis; canonical distinction recovers at finer stages (Mahāsi-noting keeps “wanting” / “disliking” distinct). -
upadhi (Skt: same) — attachment, acquisition, substrate.
def-flag: the Aṭṭhakavagga’s central soteriological axis (Sn 4.6, 4.10, etc.), with the goal articulated as anupadhi / nirupadhi (freedom from upadhi). No single rendering carries the full sense — major translators differ: Burford “substrate / basis for existence” (basis-of-becoming, not metaphysical substance) tracks the upa-√dhā “place-under” force most directly; Norman “acquisition” and Fronsdal “clinging” foreground the agential side; Bodhi “attachment” is the most general. Distinct from the Sanskrit term
upādhi(XIV, Advaita limiting-adjunct): Pāliupadhiis from upa-√dhā; Sanskritupādhiis from upa-ā-√dhā. The two are different words with the same IAST root-letters; the macron on the long ā inupādhiis the visual tell.
The predicament:
- dukkha (Skt: duḥkha) — unsatisfactory (adj.), unsatisfactoriness, suffering (nom.). The existential predicament that frames the Aṭṭhakavagga soteriology — non-clinging is the response to dukkha. The goal-pointers in II (
vimutti,āsavakkhaya,nibbāna) are co-extensively described as liberation FROM dukkha (Sn 5.6dukkhā vimoceyya,dukkha-pamokkha“release from dukkha”,dukkhass'antakaro“one who makes an end of dukkha”) and FROM the āsavas (DN 2 formulakāmāsavāpi cittaṃ vimuccati…); the āsava-language specifies the producing-currents that ending dukkha requires. Doctrinallypariññeyya(to be fully understood) within the 4NT schema, distinct from taṇhā / upādāna / diṭṭhi which arepahātabba(to be abandoned); cf. VI.a for the three-marks treatment, IX for the 4NT framing.
The goal as freedom from clinging:
- anupadhi (Skt: same) / nirupadhi (Skt: same) — without substrate, free of acquisition; the goal-pointer corresponding to upadhi.
- santi (Skt: śānti) — peace; cf. Sn 4.10
santi-pada(“peace-state”) as a synonym for the goal.
The sage:
- muni (Skt: same) — sage; lit. “silent one” (cf. mona / Skt mauna “silence”)
- moneyya (Skt: mauneya) — sagehood, the sage’s way; cf.
mona(Skt: mauna). - viveka (Skt: same) — separation, seclusion; cf. III.c for the jhāna-formula sense.
- akiñcana (Skt: same) (adj.) / ākiñcañña (Skt: ākiñcanya) (nom.) — owning nothing / owning-nothingness; the adjective describes the muni at Sn 4.9 (Māgandiya-sutta) —
akiñcanaṃ kāmabhave asattaṃ“owning nothing, unattached to sensual existence”; the abstract noun is the form compounded into the third arūpa-samāpattiākiñcaññāyatana(III.c).
Part II — The Goal: Nibbāna & Āsavakkhaya (Pāli; EBT)
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nibbāna (Skt: nirvāṇa) — the goal; lit. “blowing out, extinguishing” (nir- + √vā “blow”). Often left untransliterated; when glossed, “extinguishing” or “quenching” is the standard modern rendering.
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parinibbāna (Skt: parinirvāṇa) — final nibbāna; the nibbāna-at-death of the arhat. Near-synonym of
anupādisesa-nibbānain EBT usage — both name the nibbāna-at-death when the khandhas drop, contrasted withsaupādisesa-nibbāna, the nibbāna-while-alive of the arhat with khandhas still present. -
saupādisesa-nibbāna (Skt: sopadhiśeṣa-nirvāṇa) — nibbāna “with remainder”; the arhat’s liberation while still alive (khandhas remaining) (Itiv. 44).
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anupādisesa-nibbāna (Skt: nirupadhiśeṣa-nirvāṇa) — nibbāna “without remainder”; the nibbāna-at-death (khandhas drop) (Itiv. 44). Near-synonym of
parinibbānain EBT usage. -
amata (Skt: amṛta) — the deathless; lit. “un-dying” (a- + √mṛ “die”). A pervasive EBT epithet for the goal.
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saṃsāra (Skt: same) — the round of rebirths, the wandering-on; lit. “flowing on” (saṃ- + √sṛ “flow”). The correlative-contrast term to nibbāna; the condition from which nibbāna is release.
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āsava (Skt: āsrava) — taint, defilement; lit. “flowing, inflow/outflow” (ā- + √sru “flow”). The standard EBT enumeration is three (kāmāsava sensual-taint / bhavāsava becoming-taint / avijjāsava ignorance-taint, e.g. MN 9), with diṭṭhāsava added as a fourth in some lists (DN 33). The Jain cognate
āsravameans “karmic inflow.” -
āsavakkhaya (Skt: āsravakṣaya) — destruction of the āsavas. An early goal-description (AN 3.65, AN 6.55, MN 27, etc.) — pre-systematic in the sense that “ending of the āsavas” predates and underwrites the more elaborate nibbāna / vimutti vocabulary as a compact name for what awakening accomplishes.
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anāsava (Skt: anāsrava) — taint-free; of the arhat, of nibbāna itself.
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khīṇāsava (Skt: kṣīṇāsrava) — one whose āsavas are destroyed; the arhat’s defining state.
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taṇhākkhaya (Skt: tṛṣṇākṣaya) — the ending / destruction of craving; MN 37 (Cūḷataṇhāsaṅkhaya-sutta) frames the whole training around
taṇhākkhaya. Compressed paraphrase of the Buddha’s repeated formulation that he teaches “only dukkha and its ending” —dukkhañ ceva paññāpemi dukkhassa ca nirodhaṃ(MN 22.38, SN 22.86); cf. AN 10.58, SN 12.23. Likeāsavakkhaya, names the goal from the negative side — what is destroyed — rather than the positive (vimutti,nibbāna). -
vimutti (Skt: vimukti) — liberation, release.
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cetovimutti (Skt: cetovimukti) — liberation of mind; paired with paññāvimutti as the two aspects of the arhat’s liberation (AN 2.31, MN 43, etc.).
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paññāvimutti (Skt: prajñāvimukti) — liberation by wisdom; paired with cetovimutti.
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ubhatobhāgavimutta (Skt: ubhayatobhāgavimukta) — liberated both ways; every arhat has both cetovimutti and paññāvimutti; the ubhatobhāgavimutta arhat additionally has mastery of the
aṭṭha vimokkha(eight liberations, DN 15 / AN 8.66 — three form-based contemplations, the four āruppa attainments, andsaññāvedayitanirodha), distinguishing them from the paññāvimutta arhat (MN 70). Distinct schema from the threevimokkha-mukha(suññatā / animitta / appaṇihita) above — same root, different list. -
mutti (Skt: mukti) — liberation, release; near-synonym of vimutti, used more sparingly in the canon.
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mokkha (Skt: mokṣa) — liberation, release.
def-flag: Pāli has two homophonous
mokkhaforms, both inherited reflexes of OIA — one from OIAmukhya“chief, foremost,” one from OIA*mokṣa-(√muc “release”) “liberation.” Regular sound change: OIAkṣ→ Middle Indickkh. Pāli did not borrow the word from classical Sanskrit; Pāli and Sanskrit are sister developments from OIA. The liberation-sensemokkhais rare in the Pāli canon, which prefersvimutti/mutti/nibbāna; the soteriological weight of the word lies with the cognate Sanskritmokṣain Brahmanical Upaniṣadic and Jain usage. -
nirodha (Skt: same) — cessation, stopping; lit. “obstruction, holding back” (ni- + √rudh “obstruct”). The etymology suggests “blocking-off / bringing to a halt” rather than metaphysical annihilation. The 3rd noble truth (
nirodha-sacca, IX); the cessation-half of paṭiccasamuppāda’s “this-not-being, that does not arise.” -
nibbidā (Skt: nirveda) — disenchantment, disillusionment. Standard EBT goal-path sequence yathābhūtaṃ ñāṇadassana → nibbidā → virāga → vimutti (SN 12.23 Upanisā-sutta, etc.). “Revulsion” in older translations.
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virāga (Skt: same) — dispassion, fading of passion; same sequence.
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bodhi (Skt: same) — awakening. “Enlightenment” in older translations; “awakening” is the modern scholarly consensus that better tracks the √budh “wake” root.
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sammā-sambodhi (Skt: samyak-saṃbodhi) — complete, proper awakening; a Buddha’s kind of awakening. Standardly “right awakening” or “perfect awakening” (sammā rendered “right” / “perfect” in most translations); see VIII.a sammā note for the “proper” rendering rationale.
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suññatā (Skt: śūnyatā) — emptiness. One of the three
vimokkha-mukha(“doors to liberation”; withanimittaandappaṇihita). The three terms and their use asvimokkha-mukhaare EBT (MN 43, MN 121, etc.); the symmetric three-marks-to-three-doors mapping (suññatā ↔ anattā, animitta ↔ anicca, appaṇihita ↔ dukkha) is a path-system systematization — Paṭisambhidāmagga II 48 (Vimokkhakathā), elaborated at Visuddhimagga XXI.66–73 — not an EBT lexical correspondence (cf. VI.a). Distinct from theaṭṭha vimokkha(eight liberations, DN 15 / AN 8.66) referenced underubhatobhāgavimuttabelow — same root, different schema.def-flag: EBT sense is meditative/phenomenological (MN 121, MN 122); the Prajñāpāramitā/Madhyamaka sense — universal negation of svabhāva (not itself an ontological posit; cf. XII.b śūnyatā-śūnyatā) — goes under XII.a / XII.b.
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animitta (Skt: same) — signless (meditation / liberation); without
nimitta(III.c). One of the three vimokkha-mukha alongsidesuññatāandappaṇihita; corresponds toaniccain the (late-canonical / commentarial) three-marks-to-three-doors mapping; cf. VI.a, and IIsuññatāfor stratum. -
appaṇihita (Skt: apraṇihita) — undirected, wishless, non-aspiring (meditation / liberation). One of the three vimokkha-mukha (with
suññatāandanimitta); corresponds todukkhain the (late-canonical / commentarial) three-marks-to-three-doors mapping; cf. VI.a, and IIsuññatāfor stratum. “Undirected” follows Sujato; Bodhi “directionless / wishless.” -
pabhassara (Skt: prabhāsvara) — luminous, radiant, bright; the AN 1.49–52 description of citta (Sujato numbering; Bodhi Numerical Discourses AN 1.51–52; PTS 1.5.1–2) —
pabhassaramidaṃ, bhikkhave, cittaṃ, tañca kho āgantukehi upakkilesehi upakkiliṭṭhaṃ“luminous, bhikkhus, is this mind, but it is defiled by adventitious defilements.” A contested EBT passage: Theravāda commentarial readings identify the luminous citta withbhavaṅga(XI.a) — the subliminal life-continuum running between active cognitive moments; proto-Mahāyāna readings take it as a primordial luminous awareness, a thread that develops into Mahāyānaprabhāsvara-citta(XII.d), tathāgatagarbha (XII.d), and Vajrayāna'od gsalclear-light (XIII.b). Distinct fromviññāṇa(VI.b) — viññāṇa is object-distinguishing cognition; pabhassara names the mind’s luminous-knowing register.def-flag: pabhassara may be the closest Buddhist analogue to “phenomenal consciousness” in modern philosophy of mind (Block, Chalmers — qualia, what-it-is-likeness), but the comparison is interpretive rather than lexical; the Buddhist usage remains soteriological rather than merely descriptive.
Part III — The Gradual Training (Pāli; EBT)
The DN 2 / MN 27 gradual-training pericope (anupubbasikkhā) is the most stable pedagogical sequence in the four Nikāyas, repeated nearly verbatim across DN 2 Sāmaññaphala-sutta, MN 27 Cūḷahatthipadopama, MN 38, MN 39, MN 51, MN 53, MN 107, MN 125 (Chinese Āgama parallels at DĀ 27, MĀ 146). Its closing pericope inside the āsavakkhaya-ñāṇa fruit — yathābhūtaṃ-pajāna of the 4NT and of the 4NT-of-the-āsavas → cittaṃ vimuccati from the āsavas → vimutti-ñāṇadassana (“khīṇā jāti…”) — is the gradual training’s terminus. SN 12.23 Upanisā-sutta presents a parallel post-jhāna formula in a different idiom: yathābhūta-ñāṇadassana → nibbidā → virāga → vimutti → khaye-ñāṇa (“knowledge of destruction”). The terminal goal-terms (nibbidā, virāga, vimutti, āsavakkhaya) are at Part II as goal-pointers; commentarial jhāna apparatus is at XI.b.
III.a Sequence of the Training
The gradual-training pericope (DN 2, MN 27, MN 38, MN 39, MN 51, MN 53, MN 107, MN 125):
- sīla (Skt: śīla) — virtue, ethical conduct, morality. DN 2 expounds in three sub-sections:
cūḷasīla,majjhimasīla,mahāsīla. - indriya-saṃvara (Skt: same) — sense-restraint, restraint of the faculties.
- sati-sampajañña (Skt: smṛti-samprajanya) — mindfulness and clear comprehension; expanded as the satipaṭṭhāna training in IV.
- santuṭṭhi (Skt: saṃtuṣṭi) — contentment; DN 2’s bird-with-wings simile.
- vivitta-senāsana (Skt: vivikta-śayanāsana) — resort to a solitary lodging; the canonical training-narrative for the renunciant retiring to root-of-tree, charnel-ground, mountain-cleft. Neither necessary nor sufficient for jhāna — what the jhānas require is
viveka(III.c): separation from sensuality and unwholesome states. Physical solitude supports but doesn’t compel that. - nīvaraṇa-pahāna — abandonment of the hindrances; DN 2:
pañca nīvaraṇe pahāya cetaso upakkilese paññāya dubbalīkaraṇe(“having abandoned the five hindrances — the corruptions of the mind that weaken wisdom”). See III.b forpañca nīvaraṇa. - cattāro rūpa-jhānā — the four form-jhānas; see III.c.
- yathābhūtaṃ ñāṇadassana (Skt: yathābhūta-jñāna-darśana) — knowledge-and-vision of things as they are; lit. “as-it-has-come-to-be knowledge-and-seeing.” In DN 2’s closing pericope, the yathābhūtaṃ-pajāna is of the four noble truths and of the four-noble-truths-of-the-āsavas; this knowing-and-seeing is the proximate condition for liberation.
- vimutti (II) / āsavakkhaya (II) — the liberation event itself (DN 2:
kāmāsavāpi cittaṃ vimuccati, bhavāsavāpi cittaṃ vimuccati, avijjāsavāpi cittaṃ vimuccati); named from two sides asvimutti(the citta becoming free) andāsavakkhaya(the āsavas being destroyed). Doctrinally co-extensive descriptions of one event, not two sequential steps. - vimutti-ñāṇadassana (Skt: vimukti-jñāna-darśana) — knowledge-and-vision of liberation; the post-liberation reviewing certitude (DN 2:
vimuttasmiṃ vimuttamiti ñāṇaṃ hoti) expressed askhīṇā jāti, vusitaṃ brahmacariyaṃ, kataṃ karaṇīyaṃ, nāparaṃ itthattāyā(“birth is destroyed, the holy life has been lived, what was to be done is done, there is no more becoming-this”) (DN 2, MN 39).
Each step is developmentally conditioned by the prior; DN 2 expresses this with “endowed with X…” or “having abandoned X…” connectives rather than the explicit upanisā-vocabulary used in SN 12.23.
Parallel canonical formulas:
- SN 12.23 Upanisā-sutta substitutes a different post-yathābhūtaṃ chain:
yathābhūta-ñāṇadassana→nibbidā→virāga→vimutti→khaye-ñāṇa(=āsavakkhaya-ñāṇa). The Upanisā chain is structured around the explicitupanisā(supporting-condition) idiom —X-upanisaṃ Y(“Y has X as its supporting condition”) — and interposes an affective-evaluative pair (turning-away from formations, fading of passion) between insight and liberation that DN 2’s closing pericope does not.khaye-ñāṇaandvimutti-ñāṇadassanaare formula-distinct but doctrinally near-synonymous reviewing knowledges, naming the post-liberation certitude by what’s destroyed (the āsavas) and what’s gained (vimutti) respectively. The two formulas have been read as reflecting different strata or competing liberation-narratives within EBT (Schmithausen 1981 On Some Aspects of Descriptions of “Liberating Insight” in Early Buddhism*; Vetter 1988* The Ideas and Meditative Practices of Early Buddhism*); both are EBT.* - Note on DN 2’s surface narrative: post-fourth-jhāna, DN 2 actually presents a sequence of
ñāṇa-fruits beginning withñāṇadassanaof the body-and-the-viññāṇa-bound-thereto (a four-element-and-consciousness contemplation, distinct from step 8’s 4NTyathābhūtaṃ-ñāṇadassana), continuing throughmanomayiddhiand the five abhiññās (iddhividhi,dibbasota,cetopariyañāṇa,pubbenivāsānussati,cutūpapāta-/dibba-cakkhu-ñāṇa) — all optional fruits — and culminating ināsavakkhaya-ñāṇa. The closing pericope (4NTyathābhūtaṃ-pajāna→cittaṃ vimuccati→vimutti-ñāṇadassana) is internal to that final ñāṇa; steps 8–10 of the numbered list above synthesize by extracting them as their own developmentally-conditioned moments. The “six abhiññās” listing underabhiññābelow countsāsavakkhaya-ñāṇaas the sixth — an alternate organizing convention that folds the first DN 2 ñāṇa (body-with-viññāṇa) andmanomayiddhiinto the fourth-jhāna fruit and counts only the remaining five as numbered abhiññās.
Ethical cultivation (adjacent to sīla):
- hiri (Skt: hrī) / ottappa (Skt: apatrāpya) — shame / moral dread; the “guardians of the world” (AN 2.9, Itiv. 42); a paired-virtues cluster sitting beside sīla rather than within the numbered DN-2 sequence.
- nekkhamma (Skt: naiṣkramya) — renunciation; lit. “going forth” (nis- + √kram “step”). Component of sammā-saṅkappa (VIII.a); the going-forth from household life that frames the entire training in DN 2 / MN 27.
Frame-terms for the training:
- majjhimā paṭipadā (Skt: madhyamā pratipad) — the middle way; the frame of the first sermon (SN 56.11), identified there with the noble eightfold path.
- kusala (Skt: kuśala) / akusala (Skt: akuśala) — wholesome / unwholesome (alt. skillful / unskillful); the fundamental ethical-qualitative category applied throughout EBT — the criterion being whether an action or quality leads to suffering (dukkha) or to its cessation (cf. MN 9 Sammādiṭṭhi-sutta, AN 3.65 Kālāma-sutta).
- appamāda (Skt: apramāda) / pamāda (Skt: pramāda) — heedfulness / heedlessness. Summary term for the urgency and care of the whole training: Dhp 21
appamādo amatapadaṃ“heedfulness is the deathless path”; Dhp ch. 2 Appamādavagga; the Buddha’s last words at DN 16 —appamādena sampādetha“strive on with heedfulness.” Distinct from effort / vīriya (VI.f) — appamāda is attentive vigilance as an attitudinal stance, not exertion. - adhisīla (Skt: adhiśīla) / adhicitta (Skt: same) / adhipaññā (Skt: adhiprajñā) — higher virtue / higher mind / higher wisdom; the three higher trainings; the master frame under which the gradual training is often presented (AN 3.81, etc.).
- bhāvanā (Skt: same) — development, cultivation (used as a near-synonym for “meditation”); lit. “bringing-into-being” (causative of √bhū)
- kalyāṇa-mitta (Skt: kalyāṇa-mitra) / kalyāṇa-mittatā (Skt: kalyāṇa-mitratā) — admirable friend / admirable friendship (alt. “good friend / good friendship,” “spiritual friend / spiritual friendship”); lit. “beautiful friend” (
kalyāṇa“beautiful, good, virtuous” +mitta“friend”), with the abstract-noun suffix-tāon the second form yielding “friendship.” SN 45.2 (Upaḍḍha-sutta): the Buddha rejects Ānanda’s suggestion that admirable friendship is “half the holy life” and corrects it —sakalam eva brahmacariyaṃ“the entire holy life” is admirable friendship. The relational frame for the training: akalyāṇa-mittais one in whom the eightfold path (VIII.a) is embodied. Also at AN 8.54 (Dīghajāṇu-sutta) as a condition of present-life welfare.
The six direct knowledges (post-jhāna fruits):
- abhiññā (Skt: abhijñā) — direct knowledge, higher knowledge. The six abhiññās as a canonical set (DN 2, MN 27): (1)
iddhi-vidhāpsychic powers, (2)dibba-sotadivine ear, (3)cetopariya-ñāṇaknowing others’ minds, (4)pubbenivāsānussatirecollection of past lives, (5)dibba-cakkhu/cutūpapāta-ñāṇadivine eye / passing-and-rebirth, (6)āsavakkhaya-ñāṇaknowledge of the destruction of the taints. The last three alone are thetevijjā(three knowledges). In the long gradual-training suttas (DN 2, MN 27) the first five are presented as optional fruits available from the fourth jhāna onward — not as required steps; only the sixth is the goal itself (cf. IIāsavakkhaya).
III.b Hindrances (nīvaraṇa / Skt: nivāraṇa)
- nīvaraṇa (Skt: nivāraṇa) — hindrance; lit. “obstruction, covering” (ni- + √vṛ “cover”)
The Five Hindrances (pañca nīvaraṇāni):
- kāmacchanda (Skt: same) — sensual desire; the hindrance-mode of
kāma-rāga(fetter 4, VIII.g), same referent askāma-taṇhā(the sensuality-form of taṇhā at SN 56.11) — three abstraction levels (hindrance-moment / fetter / craving-form). - vyāpāda (Skt: same) — ill will; lit. “going against, opposing” (vi- + ā- + √pad). The intentional / dispositional aversion of wishing harm; distinct from dosa (root unwholesome state, VI.f) and paṭigha (reactive aversion-moment, VIII.g).
- thīna-middha (Skt: styāna-middha) — sloth and torpor (alt. dullness and drowsiness)
- uddhacca-kukkucca (Skt: auddhatya-kaukṛtya) — restlessness and remorse (alt. restlessness and worry)
- vicikicchā (Skt: vicikitsā) — doubt, skeptical doubt; also fetter 2 (VIII.g).
III.c Jhāna & Samādhi — EBT formulation
The rendering cluster below follows Kumāra Bhikkhu, What You Might Not Know about Jhāna & Samādhi (2022), in treating the Sutta jhāna as a progression of mental composure (not single-object absorption). Each entry carries a compressed rationale; Kumāra’s full argument is in that book.
- jhāna (Skt: dhyāna) — meditation. Standardly “meditative absorption,” “absorption,” or left as “jhāna.” Following Kumāra: the verb
jhāyati(“meditate, contemplate, think upon, brood over”) carries the core sense. AN 1.394–574 attaches “not devoid of jhāna” to many cultivations beyond the four stages — brahmavihāras, satipaṭṭhāna, sammappadhāna, iddhipāda, indriyas, recollections of death / not-self — so the word’s scope is wider than the four absorption-stages. “Absorption” imports the Visuddhimagga framing.
The four rūpa-jhānas (cattāro rūpa-jhānā):
- paṭhamajjhāna — first jhāna;
savitakka savicāra(with thinking-and-considering);vivekajaṃ pītisukhaṃ(joy-and-happiness born of separation). - dutiyajjhāna — second jhāna;
avitakka avicāra(without thinking-and-considering);ajjhattaṃ sampasādanaṃ(internal serene-confidence);cetaso ekodibhāvaṃ(mental poise);samādhijaṃ pītisukhaṃ(joy-and-happiness born of composure). - tatiyajjhāna — third jhāna;
pītiyā ca virāgā(with the fading of joy);upekkhako sato sampajāno(equanimous, mindful, fully aware);sukhaṃ kāyena paṭisaṃvedeti(sukha experienced with the body). - catutthajjhāna — fourth jhāna;
upekkhā-sati-pārisuddhi(purity of equanimity and mindfulness);adukkham-asukhaṃ(neither-suffering-nor-happiness, in the feeling-tone sense).
Core EBT meditation vocabulary:
- samādhi (Skt: same) — composure, collectedness; lit. “placing/collecting together” (saṃ- “together” + ā-√dhā “put, place”). Standardly “concentration.” Samādhi is the abstract noun corresponding to the participle
samāhita(“composed, collected”), as insamāhita citta(“composed mind”) — gathering oneself rather than fixing attention on a single object. Kumāra’s central contrast: Sutta samādhi is unification of mind; the Visuddhimagga reframes it as one-pointed concentration on a single object. Parallels: GermanSammlung“collection, collectedness, composure” (samesam-prefix); Chinese 定 (dìng) “calm, stable”; Thai forest-traditionjit ruam“collected mind”; U Tejaniya “stability of mind.” Anālayo independently arrived at the same etymology (Satipaṭṭhāna, p72). The general English noun “concentration” is older, but the now-familiar mental-focus / mental-faculty sense — the one English-speaking translators reach for here — only becomes prominent in modern English, especially from the nineteenth century onward. - samatha (Skt: śamatha) — settling. Standardly “tranquillity,” “serenity,” or “calm abiding.” Kumāra: samatha has a general sense of settling/settlement —
sabba-saṅkhāra-samatha“settling of all fabrications” (as an epithet of Nibbāna, SN 6.1);adhikaraṇa-samatha“case-settlement” in the Vinaya. In meditation specifically,cetosamatha“mental settling.” AN 4.170 (Yuganaddha-sutta) enumerates four ways samatha and vipassanā are cultivated: samatha-preceded vipassanā, vipassanā-preceded samatha, samatha-and-vipassanā yoke-tied (yuganaddha), and a fourth case in which the mind is seized bydhamma-uddhacca(restlessness regarding dhammas) and then settles into samādhi — none treats samatha and vipassanā as alternate methods to be chosen between (vs. the orthodox-Theravāda framing ofsamatha-yānika“samatha-vehicle practitioner” andsuddha-vipassanā-yānika“pure-insight practitioner” as alternate paths). Chinese 止 (zhǐ) “cease, stop, halt”; Tibetanshinay“calm abiding.” - vipassanā (Skt: vipaśyanā) — clear-seeing, insight; lit. “seeing clearly / seeing distinctly” (vi- + √paś). “Insight” is the standard rendering and entered English Buddhist usage via the late-19th-c. PTS translators (Rhys-Davids et al.); the in-sight / inward-seeing register fits the vi- + √paś “see-distinctly” sense reasonably even if not literal. “Clear-seeing” / “discernment” (following Kumāra) keep the √paś root visible without the Mahāsi insight-moment register. In the Suttas vipassanā is the distinct-seeing of saṅkhāras (Tatiya-samādhi Sutta AN 4.94), cultivated together with samatha (in any of the three ways noted under samatha), not as a separate opposed meditation-type. Much of what modern Theravāda calls “vipassanā meditation” operationalizes satipaṭṭhāna techniques; in the Nikāyas, vipassanā more often names clear-seeing / insight cultivated together with samatha rather than a separate branded method.
- nimitta (Skt: same) — basis, object. Standardly “sign” or “theme.” “Basis / object” follows Kumāra: in the Suttas nimitta is a general meditation basis or theme (what the mind is set on), NOT the visual
kasiṇa-style concentration-object of the Visuddhimagga commentarial apparatus. The commentarial three-fold nimitta series (parikamma-/uggaha-/paṭibhāga-nimitta) is at XI.b.
The Jhāna Factors (jhānaṅga) — in canonical order, as in the 1st-jhāna formula:
-
vitakka (Skt: vitarka) — thinking, thought. Standardly “applied thought” or “directed thought.” “Thinking” follows Kumāra and the wide reading — see def-flag below.
def-flag: the EBT sense of vitakka-vicāra as jhāna factors is genuinely contested. Wide reading (Polak, Arbel, Sujato, Thanissaro, Kumāra): ordinary thinking / pondering, such that first jhāna admits wholesome discursive cognition and the 2nd-jhāna avitakka-avicāra marks a phenomenal shift from verbal-discursive to non-verbal awareness. Narrow / commentarial reading (Visuddhimagga, Mahāsi, Pa Auk, Brahm): subtle attention-mechanics proper to absorption, glossed as abhiniropana (“initial application of mind to the object”) and anumajjana (“sustained examination”), with the bee-at-flower and bell-reverberation similes. Key sutta evidence for the wide reading is SN 41.6 (Kāmabhū) and MN 44 (Cūḷavedalla), which define vitakka-vicāra as vacīsaṅkhāra (“verbal formation”) because “having first thought and considered, one breaks into speech”; AN 3.60 (Saṅgārava) further shows that vitakka creates “mental sound” that a mind-reader can hear. MN 19 (Dvedhāvitakka) shows the Buddha dividing his own vitakkas into unskillful and skillful. This also explains why the 2nd jhāna — avitakka-avicāra — is called “noble silence” (
ariyo tuṇhībhāvo, SN 21.1): the first jhāna has internal speech, the second doesn’t. The narrow reading is a progressive technicalization through Abhidhamma → Buddhaghosa; see XI.b for the commentarial attention-mechanics apparatus. -
vicāra (Skt: same) — considering; lit. “moving/wandering about” (cf. vicarati “to wander”). Standardly “sustained thought,” “examination,” or “evaluation.” “Considering” follows Kumāra; see vitakka def-flag for the scholarly divide.
-
pīti (Skt: prīti) — joy. Standardly “rapture.” “Joy” (Thanissaro, Kumāra) avoids the Christian-origin ecstasy-register of “rapture,” which misfits the EBT picture of pīti arising from freedom-from-remorse (the pāmojja-chain below) and from
vivekajaṃ(separation-born). A vibrating/swaying-body “rapture” reading does not track the Sutta usage. -
sukha (Skt: same) — happiness, happy. Standardly “pleasure,” “bliss,” or “ease.” “Happiness” follows Kumāra: sukha covers a range from gross (
kāmasukhasensual happiness), to bodily (kāyika sukha), to the supramundane (nibbānaṃ paramaṃ sukhaṃ“Nibbāna is the highest happiness,” where Sāriputta adds “just that is the sukha here: where there is nothing felt” — AN 9.34). “Pleasure” and “bliss” are too narrow: sukha includes a non-vedanā evaluative sense — the 4th jhāna formula explicitly abandons sukha as a vedanā-factor (sukhassa ca pahānā→adukkham-asukhaṃ“neither-painful-nor-pleasant”), but this evaluative-sukha sense is what licenses calling Nibbānaparamaṃ sukhaṃin the same Sāriputta-AN-9.34 idiom (a sukha-of-peace that obtains where vedanā has been transcended). -
ekaggatā (Skt: ekāgratā) — one-placed-ness. Standardly “one-pointed, one-pointedness.” Kumāra against “one-pointedness”:
aggain EBT usage does not mean “point” (spatially limited location) but either “top / tip” literally (tip-of-grass, top-of-tree) or — in a contracted-form sense related toagāra“place” (cf.suññāgāra“empty place,”dānagga“alms-place”) — “place.”Ekagga= “one-placed” → idiomatically “still” (Kumāra’s preferred rendering; lead here keeps the literal) — a still mind being one that is gathered, not scattered. PED (1921) introduced “one-pointedness of mind” as a hedged rendering in quote-marks acknowledging its non-Englishness, and it became entrenched in 20th-c. Theravāda; C. A. F. Rhys Davids (1900) earlier renderedcittassekaggatāas “self-collectedness.” Thecittassa ekaggatā ayaṃ samādhipassage (MN 44.12) reads naturally as “stillness of mind — this is composure,” awkwardly as “one-pointedness of mind — this is concentration.” Cross-ref to def-flag below on whether ekaggatā is a jhāna-factor.def-flag: the recurring EBT first-jhāna formula foregrounds four terms —
vitakka,vicāra,pīti,sukha— withekaggatāappearing in the same paragraph as a separate mental quality but not counted among those four in the formula itself. MN 43 (Mahāvedalla,paṭhamajjhānaṃ pañcaṅgikaṃ) explicitly lists first jhāna as five-factored, addingcittass'ekaggatāas the fifth — so the five-factor enumeration is sutta-attested. Its development as a formalpañca-jhānaṅgaframework (the systematic jhāna-factor scheme as such) is Abhidhamma/commentarial —cittass'ekaggatāalready among the absorption factors in Dhammasaṅgaṇī; see XI.b.
Adjacent / supporting terms (not jhāna factors):
- viveka (Skt: same) — separation. Standardly “seclusion.” “Separation” (following Kumāra) tracks the adverbial
vivicca“having separated” in the 1st jhāna formula —vivekajaṃ pītisukhaṃ, “joy-and-happiness born of separation (from sensuality and unwholesome states).” - pāmojja (Skt: prāmodya) — gladness; lit. “rejoicing, delight” (from
pamodati“rejoice, enjoy, be glad”). “Gladness” follows Kumāra. Not itself a jhāna factor. Two canonical chains pass through pāmojja: (a) the sīla-rooted gladdening-chain (AN 10.1, AN 10.2, AN 11.1) — sīla → avippaṭisāra (freedom from remorse) → pāmojja (gladness) → pīti (joy) → passaddhi (tranquillity) → sukha (happiness) → samādhi (composure) → yathābhūta-ñāṇa-dassana — running upstream into the jhānas; and (b) the SN 12.23 Upanisā-sutta transcendental DO chain, which begins with dukkha → saddhā (faith) → pāmojja → pīti → passaddhi → sukha → samādhi → yathābhūta-ñāṇadassana → nibbidā → virāga → vimutti → khaye-ñāṇa. Both pass through the same affective ascent (pāmojja → pīti → passaddhi → sukha → samādhi); they differ in their entry-points (virtue vs. seeing-suffering) and in (b)‘s extension past samādhi into the goal-pointers. - ekodibhāva (Skt: ekotibhāva) — poise, equipoise; lit. “equipoised state.” Standardly “unification” or “singleness” (of mind). “Poise” follows Kumāra’s proposed derivation —
ekahere bearing the less-common sense “equal” (cf. Latinaequus) +odi(forodhi,o-+ √dhā “hold inside”) → “equal-inside-holding” = equipoise; standard Pāli lexicography (PED, DPD) instead connectsekodiwith “one aim” / single-pointed unification. The reading is contextually motivated by Sn 4.16ekodi nipako sato— “poised, judicious, mindful,” where “unified” cannot render. Not itself a jhāna factor; characterizes the 2nd jhāna’scetaso ekodibhāvaṃ(“mental poise”).
The Formless Attainments (cattāro arūpa-samāpatti):
- arūpa-samāpatti (Skt: ārūpya-samāpatti) — formless attainment
- ākāsānañcāyatana (Skt: ākāśānantyāyatana) — base of infinite space
- viññāṇañcāyatana (Skt: vijñānānantyāyatana) — base of infinite consciousness
- ākiñcaññāyatana (Skt: ākiṃcanyāyatana) — base of nothingness
- nevasaññānāsaññāyatana (Skt: naivasaṃjñānāsaṃjñāyatana) — base of neither-perception-nor-non-perception
- saññāvedayitanirodha (Skt: saṃjñāvedayitanirodha) — cessation of perception and feeling; the attainment beyond the four arūpa-samāpattis.
- nirodha-samāpatti (Skt: same) — attainment of cessation; =
saññāvedayitanirodha; same referent, shorter name.
Part IV — Satipaṭṭhāna (Pāli; EBT)
def-flag on the Part: the inclusion of the 21-exercise expansion (ānāpāna, four postures, clear comprehension, 31 body parts, four elements, nine charnel grounds, etc.) in the earliest stratum of MN 10 / DN 22 is contested in scholarship (Sujato, Anālayo disagree); the basic four-foundation framework is uncontroversially EBT.
-
satipaṭṭhāna (Skt: smṛtyupasthāna) — establishment of mindfulness, foundation of mindfulness
-
sati (Skt: smṛti) — mindfulness; lit. “remembering, recollection” (√smṛ “remember” — same root as Vedic
smṛti“that which is remembered, tradition”). Recurs across the seven sets: as sammā-sati on the eightfold path (VIII.a), as bojjhaṅga (VIII.b), as faculty (VIII.c), as power (VIII.d) — and as the EBT-attested cetasika (VI.f).def-flag on the “mindfulness” rendering: the Pāli core-semantic is a memory-and-attention fusion — keeping-in-mind, holding-in-awareness, not-forgetting-what-should-be-attended-to (the object of practice, the teaching, the bodily posture, etc.). “Mindfulness” is an older English word, but its use as a Buddhist technical rendering of
satibegins with late-19th-c. Buddhist studies (Rhys Davids, Buddhist Suttas, 1881); the rendering lost both the mnemonic layer and the deliberateness layer; in modern pop-mindfulness usage it has collapsed further into bare present-moment awareness, stripped of the object-keeping and remembering-the-instruction dimensions. Sujato has pushed “remembering” or “memory”; Gethin (“On Some Definitions of Mindfulness,” 2011) has written the definitive critical survey. The rendering is now too entrenched to displace, but the √smṛ-root sense matters for reading sati as “holding the teaching / object-of-attention in mind” — a cognitive discipline with directional content — rather than as the thinner “being aware” register pop-mindfulness usage has accreted. This divergence is a live problem across the glossary: wherever “mindfulness” appears (IV, VI.f, VIII.a/b/c/d,sati-sampajaññain III.a), the Pāli term is doing heavier lifting than the English naming suggests. -
anupassanā (Skt: anupaśyanā) — contemplation, sustained observation; lit. “looking-along, repeated-seeing” (anu- “along, repeatedly” + √paś “see”). The abstract noun underlying all four foundation-names below; the satipaṭṭhāna formula’s
kāye kāyānupassī viharati(“dwells contemplating the body in the body”) makes it the verbal-form of the practice.
The Four Foundations (cattāro satipaṭṭhānā):
- kāyānupassanā (Skt: kāyānupaśyanā) — contemplation of the body; the body-section within the four-satipaṭṭhāna framework. Cf.
kāyagatāsatibelow — body-mindfulness as a self-standing practice in MN 119, covering substantially the same content (breathing, postures, sampajañña, 31 body parts, four elements, charnel-ground contemplations). - vedanānupassanā (Skt: vedanānupaśyanā) — contemplation of feelings
- cittānupassanā (Skt: cittānupaśyanā) — contemplation of mind
- dhammānupassanā (Skt: dharmānupaśyanā) — contemplation of mental objects / of phenomena / of dhammas; the ambiguity is deliberate — “dhamma” here spans the teaching, categories of analysis, and phenomena generally.
Associated terms:
- ānāpānasati (Skt: ānāpānasmṛti) — mindfulness of breathing
- kāyagatāsati (Skt: kāyagatāsmṛti) — mindfulness directed to the body, mindfulness immersed in the body. Title and topic of MN 119, presenting body-mindfulness as a self-standing practice (breathing, postures, sampajañña, 31 body parts, four elements, charnel-ground contemplations) rather than within the four-satipaṭṭhāna framework of MN 10 / DN 22. AN 1.563 lists it as a practice “conducing to great benefit” (
mahānusaṃsa). - sampajañña (Skt: samprajanya) — clear comprehension, clear knowing, full awareness;
sato sampajāno— “mindful and fully aware” — the pair describing the meditator throughout the gradual training. “Full awareness” is Kumāra’s rendering; “clear comprehension” (Bodhi, Ñāṇamoli) is the traditional phrasing. Sati Sutta (SN 47.35) defines sampajañña as knowing feelings, thoughts, and perceptions as they arise, persist, and disappear. - ātāpī (Skt: ātāpin) — ardent; element of the satipaṭṭhāna refrain formula.
- abhijjhā-domanassa (Skt: abhidhyā-daurmanasya) — covetousness and grief; the refrain pairs ātāpī with having put these away.
Part V — Brahmavihāras (Pāli; EBT)
- brahmavihāra (Skt: same) — divine abiding, sublime abiding; lit. “brahma-dwelling”
- appamāṇā (Skt: apramāṇa) — immeasurable, boundless; the four brahmavihāras as “the four immeasurables.”
The Four Brahmavihāras (cattāro brahmavihārā) — listed canonically in this order across the Nikāyas; Visuddhimagga ch. IX (the Brahmavihāra-niddesa, in commentarial XI.b) reads the order as developmental (karuṇā / muditā extending from mettā toward suffering / flourishing beings; upekkhā integrating and culminating).
- mettā (Skt: maitrī) — loving-kindness; alt. “good-will” (Thanissaro), “friendliness,” “loving-friendliness” (Bhante Gunaratana); lit. “friend-ness” (from mitra “friend”)
- karuṇā (Skt: same) — compassion
- muditā (Skt: same) — appreciative joy, altruistic joy; joy at another’s flourishing. “Sympathetic joy” is the older translator idiom (pre-Bloom sympathy/empathy distinction); “appreciative joy” and “altruistic joy” (Thanissaro) avoid the empathy-as-affective-mirroring reading — muditā is neither feeling-into another’s state nor concern-for-another’s-wellbeing but joyful appreciation of their flourishing.
- upekkhā (Skt: upekṣā) — equanimity; lit. “looking-over, looking-past” (upa- + √īkṣ “see”)
Part VI — Understanding Experience (Pāli; EBT)
VI.a Three Marks (tilakkhaṇa / Skt: trilakṣaṇa)
- anicca (Skt: anitya) — impermanent (adj.), impermanence (nom.); lit. “not-lasting” (a- + nicca “lasting, constant”). Corresponds to
animitta(signless liberation) in the (late-canonical / commentarial) three-marks-to-three-doors mapping; cf. IIsuññatāfor stratum. - dukkha (Skt: duḥkha) — unsatisfactory (adj.), unsatisfactoriness, suffering (nom.). A traditional folk etymology parses du-kha as “bad axle-hole” (contrasted with su-kha “good axle-hole”) — memorable but philologically unreliable. The 1st noble truth (IX); corresponds to
appaṇihita(undirected liberation) in the (late-canonical / commentarial) three-marks-to-three-doors mapping; cf. IIsuññatāfor stratum. - anattā (Skt: anātman) — not-self (serves adj. and nom.); a- privative + attā “self.” Corresponds to
suññatā(empty liberation) in the (late-canonical / commentarial) three-marks-to-three-doors mapping; cf. IIsuññatāfor stratum. Sanskrit-tradition counterpartnairātmya(selflessness of persons and dharmas) extends the doctrine to dharmas in Mahāyāna (XII.b).
VI.b Aggregates (khandha / Skt: skandha)
- khandha (Skt: skandha) — aggregate, heap, bundle; lit. “shoulder, trunk (of a tree), mass”
The Five Aggregates (pañcakkhandha):
-
rūpa (Skt: same) — form, material form; Bodhi sometimes renders “materiality.”
-
vedanā (Skt: same) — feeling, hedonic tone (pleasant, unpleasant, or neither-pleasant-nor-unpleasant tonal quality of experience); also DO link 7 (VII.a); 2nd satipaṭṭhāna foundation (IV).
-
saññā (Skt: saṃjñā) — perception; lit. “together-knowing” (saṃ- + √jñā). Covers recognition, labeling, apperception.
-
saṅkhāra (Skt: saṃskāra) — (here, the 4th aggregate) intentional formations, intentional activities; lit. “con-struction, together-making” (saṃ- + √kṛ “do, make”). The Abhi. takes cetanā (intention, VI.f) as the leading factor of this aggregate, hence the older rendering “volitional formations” (Bodhi) — re-rendered “intentional” here for consistency with cetanā = intention. Alternative renderings: “fabrications” (widespread in modern translator/teacher consensus — Thanissaro’s signature, also Sujato, Anālayo, Goldstein, Kornfield, etc.) emphasizes the saṃ-√kṛ “together-making” root over the cetanā-specific reading; Sujato’s “choices” emphasizes the active cetanā-led-decision angle.
def-flag:
saṅkhārahas at least five distinct doctrinal uses: (1) the second link in dependent origination — intentional formations conditioning consciousness (VII.a); (2) the fourth aggregate — intentional / constructive factors led by cetanā (here); (3) broadly, “all conditioned phenomena” / “all fabrications” (sabbe saṅkhārā aniccā“all fabrications are impermanent” — see VII.b); (4) the triadkāya-saṅkhāra/vacī-saṅkhāra/citta-saṅkhāra(bodily, verbal, mental formations / fabrications — MN 44, MN 9); (5)āyu-saṅkhārā— life-formations/life-force (MN 43, DN 16). Contexts do not reduce to a single gloss. -
viññāṇa (Skt: vijñāna) — consciousness; lit. “knowing-apart” (vi- “apart, distinct” + √jñā “know”) — the cognitive moment of being-aware-of-an-object, distinguishing X from non-X. Six kinds: cakkhu-, sota-, ghāna-, jivhā-, kāya-, mano-viññāṇa — one per sense-modality. Also DO link 3 (VII.a); the consciousness-element (viññāṇa-dhātu, VI.d). Distinct from
citta(heart-mind, VI.f) andmano(mind-as-sense-base, VI.c) — viññāṇa is the cognitive event arising at any sense-base; mano is itself a sense-base, the sixth one (mano-viññāṇa = the cognition arising at mano, parallel to cakkhu-viññāṇa at the eye). EBT sometimes treats the three (citta / mano / viññāṇa) as interchangeable (SN 12.61).
- upādāna-khandha (Skt: upādāna-skandha) — clinging-aggregate, aggregate subject to clinging; the five khandhas insofar as they are objects of upādāna.
VI.c Sense Bases (saḷāyatana / Skt: ṣaḍāyatana)
Four overlapping technical terms — three EBT (āyatana, indriya, dhātu) and one Abhi./commentarial (dvāra) — for the standing apparatus at each sense-organ. In the Abhi. systematization of the EBT triad, all three terms co-refer for the five physical sense-organs to a single subtle-matter referent (pasāda-rūpa: cakkhu-pasāda “eye-sensitivity,” sota-pasāda “ear-sensitivity,” etc.; XI.a) — the lenses (locus, capacity, constituent) remain conceptually distinct even when they pick out one referent. The mental case is different — mano has no pasāda-rūpa, and the three Abhi. framings of mind are not co-extensive here as they are for the five physical sense-organs: manāyatana (mind as one of the 12 āyatanas) and manindriya (mind as one of the 22 indriyas) both span the full set of 89/121 cittas, while mano-dhātu is narrower — one of the seven viññāṇa-dhātus, denoting only the three cittas that perform the adverting-and-receiving function (pañca-dvārāvajjana and the two sampaṭicchana cittas), with the rest of the mental cittas falling under mano-viññāṇa-dhātu.
- āyatana (here, VI.c) — base / sphere / locus; the eye as the where-of-seeing. The canonical 12-āyatana analysis (6 internal + 6 external).
- indriya (VIII.c; Abhi. expands to 22 faculties) — faculty / controlling-power (from indra “lord, chief”); the eye as the structural capacity / dispositional power enabling seeing — distinct from the actual seeing-event (
viññāṇa). - dhātu (VI.d) — element / constituent; the eye as a basic constituent in the 18-element analysis.
- dvāra (XI.a) — door / gate (Abhi./commentarial); the eye as the access-point through which objects enter cognition.
Abhi. explicitly identifies these for the eye: cakkhāyatana = cakkhundriya = cakkhu-dhātu — same cakkhu-pasāda referent under three (or four) lenses; the lenses are conceptually distinct (locus / capacity / constituent / access-point) even when they pick out one referent, and all name the standing apparatus rather than the cognitive event. (Parallel identification holds for the other four physical sense-organs. The mental case diverges as noted above — manāyatana / manindriya / mano-dhātu do not all map onto one referent.) The actual seeing/hearing-as-event is viññāṇa (eye-consciousness, ear-consciousness, etc.; VI.b) arising from base + object via phassa (contact, VI.c) — saḷāyatana → phassa → vedanā at VII.a tracks the structural-to-dynamic transition.
- āyatana (Skt: same) — sense-base, sense-sphere
- saḷāyatana (Skt: ṣaḍāyatana) — the six sense-bases; also DO link 5 (VII.a).
The Six Sense-bases:
- cakkhu (Skt: cakṣus) — eye
- sota (Skt: śrotra) — ear
- ghāna (Skt: ghrāṇa) — nose
- jivhā (Skt: jihvā) — tongue
- kāya (Skt: same) — body
- mano (Skt: manas) — mind (as the sixth sense-base); the cognitive faculty grasping
dhamma(mental object); kept distinct fromcitta(mind, heart-mind, VI.f) andviññāṇa(consciousness, VI.b).
The Six Sense-objects (corresponding to the six bases):
- rūpa (Skt: same) — visible form, sight-object; cf. VI.b and VI.e.
- sadda (Skt: śabda) — sound
- gandha (Skt: same) — smell, odor
- rasa (Skt: same) — taste, flavor
- phoṭṭhabba (Skt: spraṣṭavya) — tangible, touch-object
- dhamma (Skt: dharma) — mental object, mind-object; cf. XI.a for the Abhi. “ultimate constituent” technical sense.
- phassa (Skt: sparśa) — contact; also DO link 6.
VI.d Elements (dhātu)
- dhātu (Skt: same) — element; lit. “that which places/holds” (from √dhā “place”)
- pathavī-dhātu (Skt: pṛthivī-dhātu) — earth element (solidity)
- āpo-dhātu (Skt: ap-dhātu) — water element (cohesion)
- tejo-dhātu (Skt: tejas-dhātu) — fire element (heat)
- vāyo-dhātu (Skt: vāyu-dhātu) — wind / air element (motion)
- ākāsa-dhātu (Skt: ākāśa-dhātu) — space element
- viññāṇa-dhātu (Skt: vijñāna-dhātu) — consciousness element; cf.
viññāṇa(5th aggregate, VI.b; DO link 3, VII.a).
Stephen Procter (MIDL — Mindfulness in Daily Life) frames the four primary elements experientially as quality-ranges directly observed in body and mind, citing MN 10’s 'This is earth element, this is water element, this is fire element, & this is wind element':
- earth (
pathavī) — range of solidity: hardness, softness, pressure, heaviness, lightness - water (
āpo) — range of cohesion: wetness, dryness, stickiness, trickling - fire (
tejo) — range of temperature: hotness, warmth, coolness (extends the canonical “heat” rendering to include coolness) - wind (
vāyo) — range of movement: movement, vibration, contraction, expansion
Each element-quality is most readily encountered at specific phenomenological loci — earth at body-contact-points, water in saliva / mouth / lips and the stickiness of mental qualities, fire in body and mental qualities, wind in breathing / physical pain / attention-movement. The framing keeps the elements as direct experiential observables rather than as “external” physical substances — consistent with the canonical satipaṭṭhāna treatment at MN 10 / MN 28 / MN 62.
VI.e Form and Name-and-form
- rūpa (Skt: same) — form, material form; cf. VI.b (rūpa as 1st khandha — broader material-form sense) and VI.c (rūpa as sight-object specifically).
- arūpa (Skt: same) — formless, immaterial
- nāma-rūpa (Skt: same) — name-and-form; standardly “name-and-form” (Bodhi, Sujato, Thanissaro); Bodhi elsewhere “mentality-materiality.” Also DO link 4.
- jīva (Skt: same) — soul, life-principle; in EBT chiefly in the avyākata formulas (e.g.,
taṃ jīvaṃ taṃ sarīraṃ“the soul is the body”); the technical Jaina/Vedāntic sense goes under XIV.
VI.f Mental Qualities & Functions (EBT-attested)
def-flag on the section: this gathers EBT-attested mental qualities, factors, and functions — covering both what would later be systematized as cetasika (concomitant mental factors) in Theravāda Abhi. and structural mind-terms (e.g., citta itself, ñāṇa) that are not cetasika under the technical 52-cetasika typology. cetasika as a category delimiting a fixed list of 52 is an Abhi. development; the systematic cetasika-theory apparatus is in XI.a.
- cetasika (Skt: caitasika / caitta) — mental factor, mental concomitant; the umbrella category for the qualities listed below. The technical 52-cetasika typology is at XI.a.
- citta (Skt: same) — mind, heart-mind; the affective/intentional sense, distinct from
viññāṇa(consciousness, VI.b) andmano(mind-as-sense-base, VI.c). 3rd satipaṭṭhāna foundation (IV); also the iddhipāda-sense at VIII.f. - cetanā (Skt: same) — intention; AN 6.63 famously defines kamma as cetanā: cetanāhaṃ bhikkhave kammaṃ vadāmi — “what I call kamma, monks, is intention.” Distinct from
saṅkappa(deliberate forming/disposing of mind — VIII.a sammā-saṅkappa). - manasikāra (Skt: same) — attention, bringing to mind; lit. “mind-making” (manas + √kṛ)
- saddhā (Skt: śraddhā) — faith; lit. “putting heart on” (śrad + √dhā). Faculty (VIII.c) and power (VIII.d).
- chanda (Skt: same) — motivation, zeal, wish-to-do; in the wholesome / iddhipāda sense (VIII.f), explicitly distinct from
taṇhā— chanda is the directional motivation that drives wholesome cultivation, taṇhā is the dukkha-generating craving. - vīriya (Skt: vīrya) — effort, energy, vigor; lit. “heroic-ness” (from vīra “hero”). Recurs across the seven sets: bojjhaṅga (VIII.b), faculty (VIII.c), power (VIII.d), sammappadhāna (VIII.e), iddhipāda (VIII.f), and as sammā-vāyāma (VIII.a).
- passaddhi (Skt: praśrabdhi) — tranquillity, calm, repose; also bojjhaṅga (VIII.b).
- paññā (Skt: prajñā) — wisdom; faculty (VIII.c) and power (VIII.d); the wisdom-section of the eightfold path (sammā-diṭṭhi + sammā-saṅkappa, VIII.a).
- ñāṇa (Skt: jñāna) — knowledge, direct knowledge; cf. yathābhūtaṃ ñāṇadassana (III.a), the sixteen vipassanā-ñāṇas (XI.b).
- upekkhā (Skt: upekṣā) — equanimity; cf. V (brahmavihāra) and VIII.b (bojjhaṅga); also the 4th-jhāna characteristic (III.c).
Wholesome and unwholesome roots (mūla):
- kusala-mūla (Skt: kuśala-mūla) / akusala-mūla (Skt: akuśala-mūla) — wholesome / unwholesome roots; the three wholesome and three unwholesome root-qualities paired as a root-analytic schema (AN 3.34, etc.); cf. III.a
kusala/akusala. - lobha (Skt: same) / dosa (Skt: dveṣa) / moha (Skt: same) — greed (covetous-pull-toward), hatred, delusion; the three akusala-mūla. At the root-analytic level:
lobhais the broad craving-side (mapping totaṇhā);dosais the aversion-side (the structural parallel that licenses the modern insight-pedagogy “craving / aversion” framing — see Itaṇhādef-flag);mohamaps toavijjā(DO link 1, fetter 10). Sensuality-restricted manifestations at lower analytic levels —kāma-rāga(VIII.g fetter 4, eliminated at 3rd path while broader taṇhā extends through bhava-/rūpa-/arūpa-forms only fully ended at 4th path),kāmacchanda(III.b hindrance),kāma-taṇhā(sensuality-form of the three-fold taṇhā at SN 56.11). Aversion-mode at lower levels —paṭigha(VIII.g fetter 5, reactive aversion-moment),vyāpāda(III.b hindrance, intentional ill-will-as-disposition). - alobha (Skt: same) / adosa (Skt: adveṣa) / amoha (Skt: same) — non-greed, non-hatred, non-delusion; the three kusala-mūla.
- rāga (Skt: same) — passion, lust; the broader pull-toward term, paired throughout EBT with dosa and moha. Related to but broader than
lobha— rāga is the general coloring/passion register,lobhathe technical root-quality. Reappears compounded in the fetters as kāma-rāga (4), rūpa-rāga (6), arūpa-rāga (7) — see VIII.g. - domanassa (Skt: daurmanasya) — mental pain, sadness, displeasure; cf. IV satipaṭṭhāna refrain (
abhijjhā-domanassa). - somanassa (Skt: saumanasya) — mental pleasure, gladness, joy
Part VII — Dependent Origination & Causal Frame (Pāli; EBT)
VII.a Twelve Links (paṭiccasamuppāda / Skt: pratītyasamutpāda)
- paṭiccasamuppāda (Skt: pratītyasamutpāda) — dependent origination, dependent arising; lit. “arising-together-in-dependence” (paṭicca “depending on” + saṃ- “together” + uppāda “arising”)
- idappaccayatā (Skt: idaṃpratyayatā) — specific conditionality, this-that conditionality; lit. “this-as-condition-ness”
- avijjā (Skt: avidyā) — ignorance; lit. “not-knowing” (a- + √vid “know”). Also fetter 10 (VIII.g); maps to
moha(delusion, VI.f) at the root-analytic level. - saṅkhāra (Skt: saṃskāra) — (here, DO link 2) intentional formations, intentional activities; cf. VI.b saṅkhāra def-flag.
- viññāṇa (Skt: vijñāna) — consciousness; cf. VI.b (5th aggregate) and VI.d (consciousness-element).
- nāma-rūpa (Skt: same) — name-and-form; cf. VI.e.
- saḷāyatana (Skt: ṣaḍāyatana) — six sense-bases; cf. VI.c.
- phassa (Skt: sparśa) — contact; cf. VI.c.
- vedanā (Skt: same) — feeling; cf. VI.b (2nd aggregate); 2nd satipaṭṭhāna foundation (IV).
- taṇhā (Skt: tṛṣṇā) — craving; cf. Part I for the def-flag on craving vs. the modern insight-pedagogy “craving / aversion” framing.
- upādāna (Skt: same) — clinging
- bhava (Skt: same) — becoming; Bodhi renders “existence” to emphasize the state-of-being resulting from upādāna.
- jāti (Skt: same) — birth
- jarā-maraṇa (Skt: same) — aging-and-death
The canonical formula extends with the trailing phrase: ...jarā-maraṇa-soka-parideva-dukkha-domanassa-upāyāsa sambhavanti — “aging, death, sorrow, lamentation, dukkha, displeasure, despair come into being.” The chain culminates in evametassa kevalassa dukkhakkhandhassa samudayo hoti (“thus is the arising of this whole mass of dukkha”) — and the reverse formula in ...nirodho hoti (“thus is the cessation”). The 12 links explain the arising and cessation of dukkha (I); dukkha is the predicament the chain accounts for, not a discrete link within it.
VII.b Causal-Frame Terms
- hetu (Skt: same) — cause
- paccaya (Skt: pratyaya) — condition
- nidāna (Skt: same) — source, cause, causal link
- saṅkhāra (Skt: saṃskāra) — (here, sense 3 of the def-flag at VI.b) all conditioned phenomena, all fabrications; the noun corresponding to
saṅkhatabelow — used insabbe saṅkhārā aniccā(“all fabrications are impermanent”),sabba-saṅkhāra-samatha(“settling of all fabrications,” epithet of nibbāna at SN 6.1). Cross-ref to VI.b def-flag for the five distinct senses of saṅkhāra. - saṅkhata (Skt: saṃskṛta) — conditioned, constructed, fabricated
- asaṅkhata (Skt: asaṃskṛta) — unconditioned, unconstructed, unfabricated; standard epithet of nibbāna (cf. II).
- kamma (Skt: karman) — action; usually left untransliterated in modern usage. EBT-defined as cetanā (intention, VI.f) at AN 6.63: “cetanāhaṃ bhikkhave kammaṃ vadāmi” — “what I call kamma, monks, is intention.”
- vipāka (Skt: same) — result, fruition (of kamma); lit. “ripening”
Part VIII — Path Systematizations within EBT (Pāli; EBT)
The seven sets (bodhipakkhiyā dhammā) are grouped together in EBT material (DN 16, MN 103, SN 22.81, AN 7.67 — per Gethin, The Buddhist Path to Awakening). What’s late-canonical/commentarial is (a) the strict identification of bodhipakkhiya-dhammā with exactly these seven sets, (b) the fixed count “37,” and (c) the systematic cross-mapping of items across sets.
-
bodhipakkhiyā dhammā (Skt: bodhipakṣa-dharma) — qualities conducive to awakening, factors of awakening; lit. “awakening-side dhammas.”
def-flag: see Part header; the “37” as a fixed technical enumeration is late.
VIII.a Noble Eightfold Path (ariya aṭṭhaṅgika magga / Skt: āryāṣṭāṅgamārga)
Note on sammā: rendered “proper” throughout, following Kumāra (2022). Standardly rendered “right” (Bodhi, Sujato, Thanissaro) — the near-universal Anglophone convention. Sammā is sam- “together, completely, correctly” — perfected / complete / correct — not English “right vs. wrong” in any moral-binary sense. “Proper” is a better calque; “right” is the reader’s likely first encounter with each term. The Pāli-form references throughout this glossary (sammā-diṭṭhi, sammā-samādhi, etc.) stay as Pāli.
Wisdom (paññā / Skt: prajñā)
- sammā-diṭṭhi (Skt: samyag-dṛṣṭi) — proper view; contrasts with the diṭṭhi-as-view-to-be-dropped of Part I and with sakkāya-diṭṭhi (fetter 1, VIII.g).
- sammā-saṅkappa (Skt: samyak-saṃkalpa) — proper thought, proper resolve; modern textbooks frequently render “right intention,” but “intention” is more strictly cetanā (VI.f). Saṅkappa is the deliberate forming/disposing of mind, defined at MN 117 as thoughts of nekkhamma (renunciation, III.a), abyāpāda (non-ill-will), and avihiṃsā (non-cruelty).
Ethical Conduct (sīla / Skt: śīla)
- sammā-vācā (Skt: samyag-vāc) — proper speech
- sammā-kammanta (Skt: samyak-karmānta) — proper action
- sammā-ājīva (Skt: samyag-ājīva) — proper livelihood
Composure (samādhi / Skt: same)
- sammā-vāyāma (Skt: samyag-vyāyāma) — proper effort; the four sammappadhānas (VIII.e) elaborate this.
- sammā-sati (Skt: samyak-smṛti) — proper mindfulness; the four satipaṭṭhānas (IV) elaborate this.
- sammā-samādhi (Skt: samyak-samādhi) — proper composure, proper collectedness; diverges on the noun too — standardly “concentration,” see III.c
samādhi. The four jhānas (III.c) elaborate this.
VIII.b Bojjhaṅgas (satta bojjhaṅgā / Skt: sapta bodhyaṅga)
- bojjhaṅga (Skt: bodhyaṅga) — factor of awakening; lit. “awakening-limb” (bodhi + aṅga).
def-flag on the subsection: the list itself and the sequential developmental chain (each factor conditioning the next — MN 118 Ānāpānasati, SN 46.3) are both EBT. What is commentarial is the balancing-pairs analysis (energy/tranquillity, investigation/concentration counterposed around mindfulness), the hindrance-counteractive mapping, and the path-moment integration. Keep the developmental-chain reading as canonical; flag the balancing-pairs framework as Theravāda comm. when it comes up.
- sati (Skt: smṛti) — mindfulness; cf. IV satipaṭṭhāna; VI.f cetasika; VIII.a/c/d.
- dhamma-vicaya (Skt: dharma-pravicaya) — investigation of dhammas, discrimination of phenomena; “dhamma” here spans mind-states, phenomena, and the teaching. The wisdom-cultivation factor of the bojjhaṅga set; the active discriminative mode of
paññā(VI.f). - vīriya (Skt: vīrya) — effort, energy; cf. VI.f cetasika; recurs across VIII.a/c/d/e/f.
- pīti (Skt: prīti) — joy; cf. III.c (jhāna factor).
- passaddhi (Skt: praśrabdhi) — tranquillity; cf. VI.f cetasika.
- samādhi (Skt: same) — composure, collectedness; cf. III.c (jhāna formulation); VIII.a/c/d.
- upekkhā (Skt: upekṣā) — equanimity; cf. V (brahmavihāra), VI.f (cetasika), III.c (4th jhāna characteristic).
VIII.c Faculties (pañca indriyāni / Skt: pañca indriya)
- indriya (Skt: same) — faculty, spiritual faculty; lit. “pertaining to Indra” (i.e. belonging to a ruler, hence “controlling faculty”). The five faculties listed below are the path-faculties; Abhi. enumerates 22 faculties total, including the six sense-faculties (cakkhundriya, sotindriya, etc.) which share referent with the VI.c sense-bases (āyatana) under a different framing — the eye as structural capacity rather than as locus.
The Five Faculties:
- saddhindriya (Skt: śraddhendriya) — faculty of faith
- vīriyindriya (Skt: vīryendriya) — faculty of energy
- satindriya (Skt: smṛtīndriya) — faculty of mindfulness
- samādhindriya (Skt: samādhīndriya) — faculty of composure (samādhi)
- paññindriya (Skt: prajñendriya) — faculty of wisdom
VIII.d Powers (pañca balāni / Skt: pañca bala)
- bala (Skt: same) — power, strength
The Five Powers — identical items to the faculties (saddhā / vīriya / sati / samādhi / paññā), held as unshakable:
- saddhā-bala — power of faith
- vīriya-bala — power of energy
- sati-bala — power of mindfulness
- samādhi-bala — power of composure
- paññā-bala — power of wisdom
VIII.e Proper Strivings (cattāro sammappadhānā / Skt: catvāri samyakpradhāna)
- sammappadhāna (Skt: samyakpradhāna) — proper striving, proper exertion
The Four Strivings:
- preventing unarisen unwholesome
- abandoning arisen unwholesome
- developing unarisen wholesome
- maintaining arisen wholesome
VIII.f Bases of Power (cattāro iddhipādā / Skt: catvāra ṛddhipāda)
- iddhipāda (Skt: ṛddhipāda) — basis of success, base of psychic power; lit. “foot of iddhi”
The Four Bases:
- chanda (Skt: same) — motivation, zeal; cf. VI.f.
- vīriya (Skt: vīrya) — effort; cf. VI.f.
- citta (Skt: same) — (purposeful) mind, application of mind; cf. VI.f in iddhipāda sense.
- vīmaṃsā (Skt: mīmāṃsā) — investigation, inquiry, examination
- iddhi (Skt: ṛddhi) — psychic/spiritual power, success, accomplishment. Pāli
iddhi= Sktṛddhi(from √ṛdh “thrive, accomplish”), NOT Sktsiddhi(from √sidh “succeed”). The two are frequently conflated in Anglophone dharma writing — probably because both came to mean yogic attainments in later tantra, andsiddhiis the form that escaped into English. In the Pāli canonical register the correct Pāli term is iddhi. Cf.siddhiat XIII.a for the Sanskrit-tantric term that absorbed iddhi-sense in later usage.
VIII.g Fetters & Stages of Awakening
def-flag on the subsection: the fetter-vocabulary and the stages-of-awakening vocabulary are both EBT, as is the broad mapping of which fetters are eliminated at which stage (MN 6, AN 10.13, etc.). What is arguably late-canonical crystallization is (a) the fixed “ten fetters” list — EBT material shows some count-variation; (b) the strict one-to-one codification of the fetter-to-stage correspondence. Cross-ref to the bodhipakkhiyā-”37” def-flag at the head of Part VIII.
Ten Fetters (dasa saṃyojanāni / Skt: daśa saṃyojana):
Lower fetters (orambhāgiya):
- sakkāya-diṭṭhi (Skt: satkāya-dṛṣṭi) — identity-view, personality-view; lit. “view-of-the-existing-group”
- vicikicchā (Skt: vicikitsā) — doubt, skeptical doubt; also hindrance (III.b).
- sīlabbata-parāmāsa (Skt: śīlavrata-parāmarśa) — clinging to precepts-and-practices, misapprehension of rites-and-rituals
Middle fetters (editorial grouping; canonically these are still part of the orambhāgiya — the sensual-realm pair distinguishing anāgāmi from sakadāgāmi):
- kāma-rāga (Skt: same) — sensual lust; cf.
kāmacchanda(sensual desire as hindrance, III.b) andlobha/rāga(root, VI.f). - paṭigha (Skt: pratigha) — aversion, repulsion, resistance; lit. “striking against” (prati- + √han). The reactive / phenomenological aversion-moment; distinct from dosa (root unwholesome state, VI.f) and vyāpāda (intentional ill-will as hindrance, III.b) at analytic levels, though the three are functionally close. The standard 10-fetter list (AN 10.13, MN 64, etc.) uses
paṭighain this slot; some sutta lists and many translations usevyāpādainterchangeably here. Often paired in commentary withanunaya(“inclining-toward”) as the basic two-fold like/dislike reaction structure.
Higher fetters (uddhambhāgiya):
- rūpa-rāga (Skt: same) — lust for form (form-sphere existence)
- arūpa-rāga (Skt: ārūpya-rāga) — lust for formlessness (formless-sphere existence)
- māna (Skt: same) — conceit, pride; lit. “measuring” (measuring self against other)
- uddhacca (Skt: auddhatya) — restlessness; cf.
uddhacca-kukkuccaas hindrance (III.b). - avijjā (Skt: avidyā) — ignorance; also DO link 1 (VII.a); maps to
moha(delusion, VI.f) at the root-analytic level.
Path, fruit, noble persons:
- magga (Skt: mārga) / phala (Skt: same) / magga-phala (Skt: mārga-phala) — path / fruit / path-and-fruit; the momentary path-consciousness immediately followed by fruition at each of the four stages. EBT has the twofold structure; the magga-phala technical analysis as distinct consciousness-moments is Abhidhammic — see XI.b vipassanā-ñāṇa sequence (ñāṇas 14–15).
- ariya-puggala (Skt: ārya-pudgala) — noble person; generic category-term for the four stages below; lit. “noble individual.”
Stages:
- puthujjana (Skt: pṛthagjana) — worldling, ordinary person; lit. “many-folk”; the baseline the stream-enterer breaks from.
- sekha (Skt: śaikṣa) — trainee, learner; the first three noble persons, still with work to do.
- asekha (Skt: aśaikṣa) — non-trainee, adept; the arahant, training complete.
- sotāpanna (Skt: srotāpanna) — stream-enterer; lit. “one who has entered the stream”; drops fetters 1–3 (sakkāya-diṭṭhi, vicikicchā, sīlabbata-parāmāsa).
- sakadāgāmī (Skt: sakṛdāgāmin) — once-returner; lit. “one who returns once”; weakens fetters 4–5 (kāma-rāga, paṭigha).
- anāgāmī (Skt: anāgāmin) — non-returner; lit. “one who does not return”; drops fetters 4–5.
- arahant (Skt: arhat) — arahant, worthy one; lit. “one worthy / deserving” (√arh “deserve”). Usually left untransliterated. Drops fetters 6–10 (rūpa-rāga, arūpa-rāga, māna, uddhacca, avijjā).
Part IX — Four Noble Truths as Systematic Frame (Pāli; EBT)
def-flag on the Part: one historical-critical hypothesis (Vetter, Schmithausen, Bronkhorst — not Anālayo’s position) treats the four noble truths as a systematizing master-schema that became increasingly central in the received Nikāyas — not adding new content relative to the gradual training and the goal, but functioning as a downstream organizing presentation. The individual truths’ contents (dukkha, taṇhā, nirodha, magga) are EBT and appear in earlier Parts; what is placed here is the master-schema framing itself.
- ariyasacca (Skt: āryasatya) — noble truth
- cattāri ariyasaccāni (Skt: catvāri āryasatyāni) — the four noble truths
The Four Noble Truths (cattāri ariyasaccāni):
- dukkha-sacca (Skt: duḥkha-satya) — truth of unsatisfactoriness / suffering; cf. VI.a
dukkha. - samudaya-sacca (Skt: samudaya-satya) — truth of (the) origin; lit. “arising-together” (saṃ- + udaya “arising”); the origin of dukkha =
taṇhā(I, VII.a). - nirodha-sacca (Skt: nirodha-satya) — truth of cessation; cf. II
nirodhaandnibbāna. - magga-sacca (Skt: mārga-satya) — truth of the path; the noble eightfold path (VIII.a).
The four functions (kicca) — what is to be done regarding each truth, as articulated in the second turning of SN 56.11:
-
pariññā (Skt: parijñā) — full understanding; the kicca for
dukkha-sacca(1st truth:pariññeyya“to be fully understood”). Distinguishes dukkha-as-pariññā-object from taṇhā-as-pahāna-object — dukkha is not what gets abandoned, but what gets seen-through. -
pahāna (Skt: prahāṇa) — abandonment, relinquishment; the kicca for
samudaya-sacca(2nd truth:pahātabba“to be abandoned”); specifically the abandonment oftaṇhā. -
sacchikiriyā (Skt: sākṣātkriyā) — realization; lit. “eye-witnessing” (sacchi- < sa- + akkhi “eye”). The kicca for
nirodha-sacca(3rd truth:sacchikātabba“to be realized”) — direct experiential realization, not inferential knowing. -
bhāvanā (Skt: same) — development, cultivation; the kicca for
magga-sacca(4th truth:bhāvetabba“to be developed”). Already present in III.a as a frame-term for the training; also a Part XI.a Abhi. category. -
tiparivaṭṭa (Skt: triparivarta) — the three turnings / twelve-aspects framing; SN 56.11.
-
sacca (Skt: satya) — truth; lit. “what is, what really is” (from sant- “being”)
Part X — Non-clinging and the Limits of Doctrine (Pāli; EBT)
X.a Non-clinging themes
- anupādāna (Skt: same) — non-clinging; also “without fuel, without sustenance” (the complement of upādāna’s fuel-sense)
- nissaya (Skt: niśraya) — support, reliance, what one leans on; often in the negative formulation — the sage leans on nothing.
- nissita (Skt: niśrita) — leaning on, dependent on, attached to; in the Aṭṭhakavagga sense of what the sage does not do.
- atammayatā (Skt: atanmayatā) — non-identification; lit. “not-made-of-that” (a- + tad-maya-tā); MN 137.
- anissita (Skt: aniśrita) — not leaning on, unsupported, independent
- tathatā (Skt: same) — suchness, the way things are; lit. “thus-ness” (from tathā “thus”). EBT sense (cf. SN 12.20 Paccaya-sutta —
tathatā avitathatā anaññathatā idappaccayatā“suchness, non-falsity, non-otherness, this-conditionality” applied to dependent origination) is epistemic / phenomenological — the way things are. Yogācāra and Tathāgatagarbha strata (XII.c / XII.d) develop ontologically-reifying readings of tathatā that Madhyamaka (XII.b) explicitly refuses. Cf. XII.a for the Prajñāpāramitā usage compatible with emptiness.
X.b Open Questions (avyākata)
- avyākata (Skt: avyākṛta) — the undeclared, the unanswered; lit. “not-explained, not-elaborated” (a- + vi- + ā- + √kṛ). The four / ten questions the Buddha set aside (MN 63 Cūḷamāluṅkya-sutta, MN 72 Aggivacchagotta-sutta, SN 44 Avyākata-saṃyutta).
The ten undeclared positions (dasa avyākata-vatthūni) — four sets, expanded to ten by enumerating positions. In the canon each is uttered with the truth-claim suffix idam eva saccaṃ, mogham aññaṃ (“only this is true; anything else is foolish”); abbreviated here:
Cosmological — eternity:
- sassato loko — the world is eternal
- asassato loko — the world is not eternal
Cosmological — extent:
- antavā loko — the world is finite
- anantavā loko — the world is infinite
Soul-body:
- taṃ jīvaṃ taṃ sarīraṃ — the soul is the same as the body
- aññaṃ jīvaṃ aññaṃ sarīraṃ — the soul is one thing, the body another
Post-mortem status of the tathāgata (the catuṣkoṭi-shaped set):
- hoti tathāgato paraṃ maraṇā — the tathāgata exists after death
- na hoti tathāgato paraṃ maraṇā — the tathāgata does not exist after death
- hoti ca na ca hoti tathāgato paraṃ maraṇā — the tathāgata both exists and does not exist after death
- neva hoti na na hoti tathāgato paraṃ maraṇā — the tathāgata neither exists nor does not exist after death
- papañca (Skt: prapañca) — conceptual proliferation, mental proliferation, objectification; standardly “conceptual proliferation” (Ñāṇananda, Bodhi); “objectification” (Bodhi alt), “mental proliferation” (Thanissaro). Its stilling (papañca-vūpasama) frames the limit of useful doctrine (MN 18).
- nippapañca (Skt: niṣprapañca) — free of proliferation, unelaborated
Part XI — Later Theravāda (Pāli; Abhi. + Theravāda comm.)
XI.a Abhidhamma systematics
Note: Abhidhamma vocabulary below is the post-canonical systematization of EBT terminology — the dhamma-theory, the enumeration of 52 cetasika, the citta-typology. The Abhi. strata treats these as paramattha-sacca (ultimate) categories; modern critical scholarship (Y. Karunadasa, Ronkin, Cousins) treats the dhamma-theory as a later analytic development rather than as recoverable from the Nikāyas themselves.
- dhamma (Skt: dharma) — (Abhi. technical sense) ultimate constituent, ultimate phenomenon; the Abhi. technical sense — the irreducible unit of Abhi.’s analytic decomposition, that-which-bears-
sabhāva(“own-nature,” below). Includes the four ultimate categories:citta(consciousness),cetasika(mental factor),rūpa(materiality), andnibbāna. Distinct fromdhammaas 6th sense-object (VI.c) and from the general teaching/phenomena sense. - paramattha (Skt: paramārtha) — ultimate (truth / reality); Abhi. sense: paramattha-sacca “ultimate truth” contrasted with sammuti-sacca “conventional truth.”
- sammuti (Skt: saṃvṛti) — convention, conventional (truth); Abhi. sense; cf. XII.b for the Madhyamaka
saṃvṛti-satyausage. - paññatti (Skt: prajñapti) — concept, designation, nominal entity; the conventional-reality counterpart to paramattha in Abhi.
- sabhāva (Skt: svabhāva) — own-nature, own-characteristic, defining nature; Abhi. sense: the characteristic by which a dhamma is analytically identifiable as that dhamma. Not to be read as the Madhyamaka target-sense of independent, self-subsisting inherent existence — cf. XII.b for the Madhyamaka critique of svabhāva, historically aimed at Sarvāstivāda / Vaibhāṣika ābhidharmika realism rather than the Theravāda system specifically, though structurally parallel.
- asabhāva (Skt: asvabhāva) — without own-nature
- cetasika (Skt: caitasika / caitta) (Abhi.) — mental factor, mental concomitant; Abhi. sense: the technical 52-cetasika typology, paired with citta in the citta-cetasika analysis. Cf. VI.f for the EBT-attested mental-quality entries.
- javana (Skt: same) — (in Abhi.) impulsion, active cognition, apperception; lit. “swift, running”
- bhavaṅga (Skt: bhavāṅga) — life-continuum, subliminal mind; lit. “factor of existence/becoming.” Theravāda commentarial readings of the AN 1.49–52
pabhassara citta(II) identify the luminous citta with bhavaṅga — the subliminal continuity-mind running between active cognitive moments. - cittavīthi (Skt: cittavīthī) — cognitive series, thought-process
- dvāra (Skt: dvāra) — door, gate; the Abhi./commentarial framing of the six internal sense-organs as access-points through which objects enter cognition. Same referent as
āyatana(VI.c) andindriya(VIII.c sense-faculty usage) — the eye/ear/etc. as access-point rather than as locus or capacity. Used especially in Mahāsi-tradition vipassanā literature (“guarding the sense-doors”); not the same asāyatana, with which it is sometimes confused in popular usage. - pasāda / pasāda-rūpa (Skt: prasāda / prasāda-rūpa) — sensitive matter, sensitive material; lit. “clarity, translucence, calm” (
pa-+ √sad “settle, be clear”). The subtle / refined matter within each gross sense-organ that is the Abhi. analysis’s actual locus of sense-cognition. Theravāda Abhi. recognizes fivepasāda-rūpa:cakkhu-pasāda(eye-sensitivity),sota-pasāda(ear-sensitivity),ghāna-pasāda(nose-sensitivity),jivhā-pasāda(tongue-sensitivity),kāya-pasāda(body-sensitivity, distributed throughout the body). Thecakkhāyatana/cakkhundriya/cakkhu-dhātutriple identification (VI.c) refers tocakkhu-pasādaas the shared referent. Loosely analogous to the modern physiological transducers (retina, cochlea) but conceived as subtle matter rather than gross sensory anatomy. Not a Sutta term; the pasāda-rūpa analysis is an Abhi. systematization (with Sarvāstivāda parallels in Abhidharmakośa). - kalāpa (Skt: same) — cluster, group, bundle
- rūpa-kalāpa (Skt: same) — material cluster, cluster of matter
- paṭṭhāna (Skt: prasthāna) — conditional relations; the 24 conditions; also the name of the Abhidhamma text.
Spheres of citta (cittāvacara):
- kāmāvacara (Skt: same) — sense-sphere (realm of sense-desire)
- rūpāvacara (Skt: same) — form-sphere (realm of subtle form)
- arūpāvacara (Skt: ārūpyāvacara) — formless-sphere (realm of formlessness)
- lokuttara (Skt: lokottara) — supramundane, transcendent; lit. “beyond the world”
XI.b Commentarial Meditation Apparatus (Visuddhimagga / aṭṭhakathā)
The Three Nimittas (commentarial three-fold progression, ascending):
- parikamma-nimitta (Skt: parikarma-nimitta) — preparatory sign; the original physical object or initial percept.
- uggaha-nimitta (Skt: udgraha-nimitta) — acquired sign, learned sign; the internalized mental image.
- paṭibhāga-nimitta (Skt: pratibhāga-nimitta) — counterpart sign; the most refined of the three, taken as an idealized mental image independent of the physical object.
Commentarial Samādhi stages:
- upacāra-samādhi (Skt: upacāra-samādhi) — access concentration, neighborhood concentration; the stage just short of absorption.
- appanā-samādhi (Skt: arpaṇā-samādhi) — absorption concentration, fixed concentration; full jhāna in the commentarial scheme.
- khaṇika-samādhi (Skt: kṣaṇika-samādhi) — momentary concentration; the form of concentration proper to vipassanā in the commentarial dry-insight (sukkha-vipassaka) path.
Jhāna-factor analysis:
-
pañca-jhānaṅga (Skt: pañca-dhyānāṅga) — the five jhāna-factors.
def-flag: the five-factor enumeration of first jhāna (
vitakka,vicāra,pīti,sukha,ekaggatā) is sutta-attested at MN 43 (Mahāvedalla,paṭhamajjhānaṃ pañcaṅgikaṃ); its development as a formalpañca-jhānaṅgaframework is Abhidhamma + Theravāda commentarial (already in Dhammasaṅgaṇī) — cf. III.cekaggatādef-flag.
Other Vism. apparatus:
- kasiṇa (Skt: kṛtsna) — kasiṇa; a meditation object used as a fixed visual or elemental basis for absorption; lit. “whole, entire.” Usually left untransliterated; “totality” when glossed.
- asubha (Skt: aśubha) — the foul, the unattractive; the ten contemplations of the foul (decomposing-corpse contemplations).
- anussati (Skt: anusmṛti) — recollection; the ten recollections (Buddhānussati, etc.), systematized in Vism.
- visuddhi (Skt: viśuddhi) — purification; the seven purifications scheme specifically (Visuddhimagga spine); cf. II for the general term.
- vipassanā-ñāṇa (Skt: vipaśyanā-jñāna) — insight-knowledge; the general category-term; see the sixteen-ñāṇa sequence below.
The Sixteen Vipassanā-ñāṇas (Visuddhimagga insight-progress series):
- nāma-rūpa-pariccheda-ñāṇa (Skt: nāma-rūpa-paricchedaka-jñāna) — knowledge of the delimitation of mind-and-matter
- paccaya-pariggaha-ñāṇa (Skt: pratyaya-parigraha-jñāna) — knowledge of discerning conditions
- sammasana-ñāṇa (Skt: sammarśana-jñāna) — knowledge of comprehension (investigating the three marks in formations)
- udayabbaya-ñāṇa (Skt: udaya-vyaya-jñāna) — knowledge of rise and fall; also “arising and passing away.”
- bhaṅga-ñāṇa (Skt: bhaṅga-jñāna) — knowledge of dissolution
- bhayatupaṭṭhāna-ñāṇa (Skt: bhayopasthāna-jñāna) — knowledge of appearance as fearful; also “knowledge of fear” / “fearfulness” (tracking the shorter
bhaya-ñāṇaform). - ādīnavānupassanā-ñāṇa (Skt: ādīnavānupaśyanā-jñāna) — knowledge of contemplation of danger; also “misery” (older translator-idiom).
- nibbidānupassanā-ñāṇa (Skt: nirvedānupaśyanā-jñāna) — knowledge of contemplation of disenchantment; also “disgust” / “aversion” (older translator-idiom). Cf.
nibbidāin II. - muñcitukamyatā-ñāṇa (Skt: mumukṣā-jñāna) — knowledge of desire for deliverance
- paṭisaṅkhānupassanā-ñāṇa (Skt: pratisaṃkhyānupaśyanā-jñāna) — knowledge of contemplation of re-examination; also “re-observation.”
- saṅkhārupekkhā-ñāṇa (Skt: saṃskāropekṣā-jñāna) — knowledge of equanimity about formations
- anuloma-ñāṇa (Skt: anuloma-jñāna) — conformity-knowledge
- gotrabhū-ñāṇa (Skt: gotrabhū-jñāna) — change-of-lineage knowledge; the transition-moment to the path.
- magga-ñāṇa (Skt: mārga-jñāna) — path-knowledge; the path-moment itself.
- phala-ñāṇa (Skt: phala-jñāna) — fruition-knowledge; immediately following the path-moment.
- paccavekkhaṇa-ñāṇa (Skt: pratyavekṣaṇā-jñāna) — reviewing-knowledge; reflection upon what has been attained.
Part XII — Mahāyāna — Sūtric (Sanskrit; XII.e in Chinese / Japanese)
Ordered by chronological-developmental stratum: Prajñāpāramitā → Madhyamaka → Yogācāra → broader Mahāyāna sūtra corpus. (First-wave chronology — Madhyamaka and Yogācāra continued to develop in dialogue after the 4th–5th c., and Yogācāra is not a strict “improvement” on Madhyamaka.)
XII.a Prajñāpāramitā
- prajñāpāramitā — the perfection of wisdom; both the doctrine and the name of the corpus (Aṣṭasāhasrikā, Pañcaviṃśatisāhasrikā, Heart Sūtra, Diamond Sūtra, etc.) in which śūnyatā is first elaborated as the central Mahāyāna doctrinal pivot.
- śūnyatā — emptiness; lit. “zero-ness, void-ness” (from śūnya “empty, zero”). Prajñāpāramitā-stratum ontological-soteriological sense: all phenomena empty of svabhāva. Cf. II for the EBT meditative sense, XII.b for Madhyamaka’s systematization of the Prajñāpāramitā teaching.
- tathatā — suchness, thusness; Prajñāpāramitā usage: the way-things-are, used compatibly with emptiness (not as a reified ultimate). The ontologically-reifying readings of tathatā develop later in the Yogācāra (XII.c) and especially the Tathāgatagarbha (XII.d) strata — Madhyamaka (XII.b) explicitly refuses those. Cf. X.a for the EBT sense.
XII.b Madhyamaka
- madhyamaka — the Middle (Way school); from madhyama “middle.”
- mādhyamika — Mādhyamika, adherent of Madhyamaka
- śūnyatā — emptiness; Madhyamaka sense: the absence of svabhāva in all phenomena. Cf. II and XII.a.
- svabhāva — own-nature, intrinsic nature, inherent existence, ultimate existence; the target of Nāgārjuna’s critique. “Inherent existence” (Garfield, Siderits) emphasizes the ontological bite; “ultimate existence” / “true existence” (Hopkins, Gelug-tradition) emphasize the bears-up-under-ultimate-analysis quality — something ultimately exists iff it has svabhāva, and Madhyamaka denies this for all phenomena (everything exists only conventionally /
saṃvṛti-sat). “Own-nature” (Gethin, more literal) is also common. Cf. XI.a for the structurally parallel Theravāda Abhi.sabhāva; Nāgārjuna’s actual historical target was Sarvāstivāda / Vaibhāṣika svabhāva-realism and analogous ābhidharmika dharma-theory more broadly, not specifically the later Theravāda Abhi system summarized in XI.a. - niḥsvabhāva — without svabhāva, lacking intrinsic nature
- nairātmya — selflessness, absence of self; abstract-noun form from
anātman(= Pālianattā, VI.a); systematized in Mahāyāna as the two selflessnesses (pudgala- / dharma-nairātmya below). - pudgala-nairātmya — selflessness of persons; the selflessness the śrāvakayāna already teaches.
- dharma-nairātmya — selflessness of dharmas; the distinctive Mahāyāna extension (no svabhāva in the dharmas themselves) — the point at which Mahāyāna departs from Abhi.
- pratītyasamutpāda — dependent origination; Madhyamaka reading:
śūnyatā,pratītyasamutpāda, andupādāya-prajñapti(“dependent designation”) are three equivalent ways of saying the same thing (MMK 24.18). The counterintuitive radical claim: phenomena themselves ARE designations in this reading — not in the realist sense where a designation is a label applied to a separately-existing thing, but in the sense that there is no thing-in-itself underlying the designation. What we call “the cup” is not an inherently-existing entity to which we apply the name “cup,” but aprajñapti-mātra(“mere imputation”). The cup IS the imputed object — it exists conventionally as such but lacks thesvabhāvathat would make it exist ultimately. Even the apparent imputation-basis (parts, causal history, function) is itself dependently designated — neither cup nor basis exists with svabhāva. The thing/name distinction the realist relies on collapses; phenomena exist only as dependent designations. Cf. VII.a. - saṃvṛti-satya — conventional truth; cf. XI.a
sammutifor the Abhi. sense. - paramārtha-satya — ultimate truth; cf. XI.a
paramattha. - dve satye — the two truths; the two-truths framing.
- catuṣkoṭi — tetralemma, four corners; lit. “four-cornered”; the fourfold logical schema (X / not-X / both / neither). Madhyamaka’s distinctive move is to negate all four positions — sometimes called the “negative catuṣkoṭi” (in modern scholarship: Garfield, Westerhoff) or
catuṣkoṭi-vinirmukta(“free from the four corners”). Nāgārjuna deploys this fourfold-negation pattern at MMK 1.1 (“not from itself, not from another, not from both, not without cause”) and MMK 22.13–16 (the Tathāgata-after-death tetralemma in the Tathāgata-parīkṣā, picking up the EBTavyākataregister at X.b); MMK 25.17–18 returns to the Tathāgata case under the nirvāṇa-parīkṣā. MMK 18.8 (sarvaṃ tathyaṃ na vā tathyaṃ tathyaṃ cātathyam eva ca / naivātathyaṃ naiva tathyaṃ etad buddhānuśāsanam) states the four-corner schema as such — phenomena’s reality-status across the four positions. - prasaṅga / Prāsaṅgika — consequence; “Prāsaṅgika” (and the matched “Svātantrika” below) is a later Tibetan doxographic classification retrojected onto Indian Madhyamaka — the school-label is Tibetan taxonomy, the method it names is Indian. The Prāsaṅgika method (associated by Tibetan doxographers with Buddhapālita and Candrakīrti, picked up by Tsongkhapa and the Gelug stream) uses consequence-only (
prasaṅga) argumentation — refuting opponents by showing that their own premises entail absurd consequences, without putting forth any counter-thesis of one’s own. The method is purely negational: it accepts no positive thesis carrying svabhāva-implication; it uses the opponent’s metaphysical presumptions (their assumption of svabhāva) to undermine the opponent’s argument from within, on the opponent’s own terms. Cf.paryudāsa/prasajya-pratiṣedha(XIV.c) for the formal grammatical-logical typology of negation that frames the prasaṅga method. Contrasts with Svātantrika (Bhāviveka), which uses autonomous positive syllogisms (svatantra-anumāna) to establish Madhyamaka conclusions. - svātantra / Svātantrika — independent inference; Svātantrika (sub-school admitting positive arguments). Like Prāsaṅgika above, “Svātantrika” is later Tibetan doxographic classification retrojected onto Indian Madhyamaka — Bhāviveka and his stream are the figures the Tibetan taxonomy assigns the label to.
- apratiṣṭhita — non-abiding, unestablished; a characterization of emptiness.
- niṣprapañca — free of conceptual proliferation, unelaborated; cf. X.b.
- śūnyatā-śūnyatā — “emptiness of emptiness”; Nāgārjuna’s guard against reifying śūnyatā into a view or ultimate — emptiness itself is empty of svabhāva and cannot be grasped as a doctrinal position. MMK 24.11 warns that śūnyatā mis-grasped “ruins the dull-witted, as a snake wrongly caught or a spell wrongly cast.” Central to Prāsaṅgika-rangtong reading: the point at which Madhyamaka refuses all ontological reification including its own apparent metaphysics.
XII.c Yogācāra
- yogācāra — Yogācāra; lit. “yoga-practice,” the practice-school
- vijñānavāda — doctrine of consciousness, consciousness-school; alternate name for Yogācāra.
- cittamātra — mind-only, nothing-but-mind
- vijñaptimātra — representation-only, cognition-only; Vasubandhu’s preferred formulation; subtly distinct from cittamātra — “vijñapti” is the appearance-in-cognition, not mind as such.
- aṣṭa-vijñāna — the eight consciousnesses (as a schema)
- ālayavijñāna — store-consciousness, storehouse consciousness, foundational consciousness; lit. “home/store-consciousness” (ālaya “abode, store”)
- kliṣṭa-manas — the defiled mind (seventh consciousness)
- manovijñāna — mind-consciousness, mental consciousness; the sixth — corresponds to EBT mano-viññāṇa (cf. VI.b
viññāṇa, VI.cmano); distinct from kliṣṭa-manas and from the five sense-consciousnesses. - pravṛtti-vijñāna — active / “turning” / forthcoming consciousnesses; the first seven, or the first six, depending on schema.
- trisvabhāva — the three natures; Yogācāra svabhāva here carries the sense “nature, aspect” (of phenomena) rather than the strong “inherent existence” critiqued by Madhyamaka — Yogācāra affirms svabhāva for paratantra and pariniṣpanna in this weaker sense.
- parikalpita-svabhāva — imagined nature, constructed nature
- paratantra-svabhāva — dependent nature, other-dependent nature
- pariniṣpanna-svabhāva — perfected nature, accomplished nature
- āśraya-parāvṛtti — transformation / revolution of the basis
- bīja — seed; technical term for karmic potentials in the ālaya.
- vāsanā — habitual trace, perfuming, latent impression; lit. “infusing, perfuming”
- pariṇāma — transformation, evolution (of consciousness); Vasubandhu’s Triṃśikā frame: the threefold
vijñāna-pariṇāma— (1) the ālayavijñāna storing seeds, (2) kliṣṭa-manas’ self-grasping, (3) the six active consciousnesses’ object-perception. The Yogācāra account of how consciousness appears to produce a world while remaining only consciousness. - svasaṃvedana / svasaṃvitti — reflexive cognition, self-awareness (of cognition); Dignāga and Dharmakīrti’s claim that every moment of cognition is implicitly aware of itself — each cognition cognizes both its object and its own cognizing. A pillar of the Dignāga-Dharmakīrti pramāṇa tradition (in Tibetan doxography: “Yogācāra-Sautrāntika” epistemology, distinct from the Yogācāra-Svātantrika Madhyamaka sub-school of Śāntarakṣita / Kamalaśīla — same Yogācāra-prefix, different second term). Contested by Mādhyamikas (Candrakīrti’s critique in Madhyamakāvatāra VI.72–76).
- nirvikalpa-jñāna — non-conceptual cognition; direct non-conceptual realization of suchness, contrasted with conceptual (
savikalpa) cognition. In Yogācāra-Buddhist epistemology (Dignāga, Dharmakīrti), the mode of knowing proper to meditative realization. Cf. XIVnirvikalpa/vikalpagenerally. - dharmatā — dharma-nature, the dharma’s nature; the pariniṣpanna, the way things are.
- dharmadhātu — dharma-realm, dharma-sphere; Yogācāra and later East Asian Mahāyāna ontological category for the total field of dharmas.
XII.d Broader Sūtra Corpus
The Mahāyāna sūtra material beyond the Prajñāpāramitā pivot: bodhisattva-path vocabulary, trikāya doctrine, tathāgatagarbha, pure-land, and East Asian Mahāyāna usages.
- mahāyāna — the Great Vehicle
- yāna — vehicle; the organizing category under which the Mahāyāna distinguishes itself.
- ekayāna — one vehicle; Lotus-sūtra frame asserting the three yānas ultimately collapse into one.
The Three Yānas:
- śrāvakayāna — hearers’ vehicle
- pratyekabuddhayāna — solitary-buddhas’ vehicle
- bodhisattvayāna — bodhisattvas’ vehicle
-
hīnayāna — lesser vehicle.
def-flag: originally a Mahāyāna polemical term for the śrāvakayāna. Modern scholarship (and inter-tradition courtesy) substitutes
śrāvakayāna/mainstream Buddhism/early Buddhism; listed here with the polemic flagged, not endorsed.
Bodhisattva-path vocabulary:
- anuttara-samyak-saṃbodhi — unsurpassed complete awakening; the Mahāyāna goal formula.
- bodhisattva — bodhisattva; lit. “awakening-being, being-(destined-for)-awakening.” Usually left untransliterated.
- bodhicitta — mind of awakening, awakening-mind; sometimes left untransliterated.
- pāramitā — perfection; the six (and in later lists ten) perfections of the bodhisattva path; cf. XII.a for
prajñāpāramitāspecifically.
The Six Pāramitās:
- dāna-pāramitā — perfection of giving / generosity
- śīla-pāramitā — perfection of ethics / virtue
- kṣānti-pāramitā — perfection of patience / forbearance
- vīrya-pāramitā — perfection of energy / diligence
- dhyāna-pāramitā — perfection of meditation
- prajñā-pāramitā — perfection of wisdom; cf. XII.a for the corpus / doctrine.
- upāya / upāya-kauśalya — skillful means; lit. “means / skill-in-means”
- dhāraṇī — mnemonic formula, protective formula; bridges Mahāyāna sūtra and tantric literature.
The Three Bodies (trikāya):
- trikāya — the three bodies; the three-bodies doctrine as a systematic frame.
-
dharmakāya (Pāli: dhammakāya) — dharma-body, truth-body.
def-flag: Pāli
dhammakāyais attested (DN 27, etc.) as “body/embodiment of dhamma” — an epithet of the Buddha; the Mahāyāna trikāya-doctrinal sense (unconditioned absolute body of the Buddha) is a later development. -
sambhogakāya — enjoyment-body, reward-body
-
nirmāṇakāya — emanation-body, manifestation-body, transformation-body
Tathāgatagarbha vocabulary:
-
tathāgatagarbha (Tathāgatagarbha) — tathāgata-womb, buddha-embryo, buddha-matrix; the central Tathāgatagarbha-stratum doctrine — the teaching that all beings have the potential for buddhahood within.
-
buddhadhātu (Tathāgatagarbha) — buddha-nature, buddha-element.
def-flag: Pāli
buddhadhātuexists meaning “Buddha-relic” or “Buddha-element”; the Mahāyāna buddha-nature doctrinal sense (synonymous with tathāgatagarbha) is the loaded one. -
prabhāsvara-citta — luminous mind; the Mahāyāna systematization of the EBT
pabhassara citta(II) theme. The intrinsic luminosity of mind that is obscured but never destroyed by defilements; closely associated with tathāgatagarbha and buddha-nature literature, and a central category in Yogācāra accounts of non-conceptual wisdom (jñāna). Vajrayāna inherits this as'od gsalclear-light (XIII.b).
Pure-land / bodhisattva-stages vocabulary:
- buddha-kṣetra — buddha-field, buddha-realm
- daśa-bhūmi — the ten stages, ten grounds (of the bodhisattva)
XII.e East Asian Mahāyāna — Chan/Zen (Chinese / Japanese)
- zuòchán (坐禅; Chinese) / zazen (坐禅; Japanese) — seated meditation; lit. “sitting Zen.” The foundational practice across Chan/Zen traditions. Sōtō zazen is often understood specifically as
shikantaza(“just sitting”) — non-objective, non-goal-directed; Rinzai zazen typically incorporates kōan-investigation. - shikantaza (只管打坐; Japanese) — “just sitting”; lit. “nothing but sitting” (只管 shikan “only / just / nothing but” + 打坐 taza “sit”). Dōgen’s articulation of zazen as the practice-realization (
shushō ittō) of awakening itself, not a method to achieve awakening; Sōtō-tradition core. - gōngàn (公案; Chinese) / kōan (公案; Japanese) — public case, paradoxical question. A teaching-narrative or impasse-question (Zhàozhōu’s
wu, “the sound of one hand,” etc.) used in Rinzai/Linji practice as an object of meditative inquiry; the “case” is the impasse the practitioner sits with until conceptual mind exhausts. - wúxīn (無心; Chinese) / mushin (無心; Japanese) — no-mind; lit. “without-mind.” Mind free of attachment to thoughts and concepts; not a blank state but mind-functioning unimpeded by self-clinging or categorizing.
- hishiryō (非思量; Japanese) — non-thinking; lit. “not-thinking.” Dōgen’s term (Fukan-zazengi) for the cognitive register of zazen — neither thinking (shiryō) nor not-thinking (fushiryō), but a third mode he describes as “the essence of zazen.”
- běnlái miànmù (本來面目; Chinese) / honraino menmoku (本来の面目; Japanese) — “original face” (often expanded as “your original face before your parents were born”). The practitioner’s nature prior to conceptual elaboration; a common kōan-frame for inquiry into Buddha-nature.
- satori (悟り; Japanese) — awakening, realization. def-flag: Zen practice (especially Rinzai) loosely distinguishes
kenshōas an initial breakthrough — seeing one’s nature — from satori as the more complete realization, though the terms are often used interchangeably; Sōtō-tradition framings de-emphasize the distinction in favor of practice-realization unity (shushō ittō). The two-stage frame (initial glimpse → full awakening) maps loosely onto Theravāda’s 1st-path / 4th-path structure (sotāpanna→arahant); structural analogy, not doctrinal equivalence (no fetter-eradication correspondence). - kenshō (見性; Japanese) — seeing (one’s) nature; lit. “see-nature”
- wu (無; Chinese) — no, not, nothingness; the Chinese gate-word of the famous Zhàozhōu kōan (Mumonkan 1).
- mu (無; Japanese) — same graph as Chinese
wu; common in Zen kōan usage and in Nishida / Kyōto-school philosophical vocabulary (“absolute nothingness”)
Part XIII — Mahāyāna — Tantric: Vajrayāna, Dzogchen & Mahāmudrā (Sanskrit / Tibetan)
Vajrayāna is doctrinally a tantric mode within Mahāyāna (Mantrayāna), not a separate vehicle in most non-Tibetan classifications. This Part isolates the tantric methodological apparatus and its Tibetan elaboration for length and vocabulary cohesion; sūtric Mahāyāna is in Part XII.
XIII.a Sanskrit-stratum
- vajrayāna — Diamond / Adamantine / Thunderbolt Vehicle
- vajra — diamond, thunderbolt, adamant; the implement, the path-principle, and a widely compounded element (vajra-guru, vajra-sattva, etc.).
- mantra — mantra, sacred formula; lit. “instrument of thought” (manas + -tra “instrument”). Included here in the tantric sense; the Pāli
manta/parittausage is separate. - tantra — tantra; lit. “loom, warp, continuum” (√tan “stretch”). def-flag: tantra names both a genre (esoteric ritual-meditation texts, distinct from public sūtra discourses) and a soteriological path-principle — taking the result as the path. Where sūtric Mahāyāna treats poisons (kleśas) as defilements to be abandoned, tantric Buddhism treats them as energies to be transformed in deity-yoga, mantra-recitation, and subtle-body practices. The Tibetan rgyud (“continuum”) frames a tantric system as a basis-path-fruit triad — the unbroken continuity between practitioner-nature (basis), method (path), and realization (fruit) is the “thread” the etymology evokes.
- maṇḍala — maṇḍala; lit. “circle, disk”
- mudrā — mudrā, seal, ritual gesture; lit. “seal”
- sādhana — practice, means of accomplishment; lit. “means of achieving”
- abhiṣeka — empowerment, initiation; lit. “sprinkling, consecration.” Tibetan
wang(Wylie: dbang). - samaya — tantric commitment / pledge; taken at abhiṣeka.
- guru — teacher, spiritual master; in Vajrayāna, soteriologically central.
- siddhi — accomplishment, attainment; both ordinary/supernormal powers and the supreme siddhi of awakening. Distinct from Pāli
iddhi(Sktṛddhi, VIII.f) —siddhi(√sidh “succeed”) andiddhi/ṛddhi(√ṛdh “thrive”) are different etymological roots that frequently get conflated in Anglophone dharma writing because both came to denote yogic attainments in later tantra; see VIII.f iddhi for the EBT register. - siddha — accomplished one; a practitioner who has attained siddhi.
- mahāsiddha — great siddha; the 84 Mahāsiddhas of the Indian tantric tradition.
- ḍākinī — ḍākinī, sky-dancer, feminine enlightened energy; Tibetan
khandro(Wylie: mkha’ ‘gro “sky-goer”). - mahāmudrā — the Great Seal; especially associated with the Kagyü realization-system, though present in other Tibetan lineages as well (notably Sakya, and via Padampa Sangye and the Shije lineage).
- mahāsukha — great bliss
XIII.b Tibetan (Dzogchen / Mahāmudrā)
-
dzogchen (Wylie: rdzogs chen) (Dzogchen) — the Great Perfection; lit. “great completion.” The Nyingma tradition’s non-dual realization-system — emphasizing the primordially-pure (
kadag) and spontaneously-present (lhundrub) nature of mind (rigpa). Often classified as the ninth and highest of the nine yānas in Nyingma doxography. -
lama (Wylie: bla ma) — lama, teacher; Tibetan rendering of Skt
guru. Tulku-lama, root-lama, etc. -
tulku (Wylie: sprul sku) — incarnate lama, recognized reincarnation; the Tibetan term that also translates Skt
nirmāṇakāya(emanation-body, XII.d); in Tibetan Buddhist institutional usage, a recognized reincarnate teacher. -
bardo (Wylie: bar do) — intermediate state, in-between state; Tibetan-tradition elaboration of Skt
antarābhava. The Bardo Thödol frames six bardos; the term has broader use beyond the between-lives bardo. -
yidam (Wylie: yi dam) — personal meditation deity; translates / functions like Skt
iṣṭa-devatā. -
rigpa (Wylie: rig pa) (Dzogchen) — awareness, pristine awareness, knowing; the Dzogchen term for non-dual awareness as the ground of experience. Translation equivalent of Skt vidyā.
-
ma rigpa (Wylie: ma rig pa) (Dzogchen) — ignorance, non-knowing, non-recognition (of rigpa); translation equivalent of Skt
avidyābut Dzogchen-specific in usage. -
‘od gsal (Wylie) / clear light — Tibetan rendering of Skt
prabhāsvara; central to Mahāmudrā, Dzogchen, and the Six Yogas of Nāropa. The clear-light nature of mind, recognized at moments of subtle dissolution (sleep, dreaming, dying) and as the goal of practice. Cognate with the EBTpabhassara(II) and Mahāyānaprabhāsvara-citta(XII.d) but with its own Vajrayāna technical apparatus. -
sems nyid (Wylie) — mind-itself, the nature of mind; the Tibetan term for the intrinsic, non-dual nature of mind as opposed to thoughts / contents arising within it. Used across Mahāmudrā and Dzogchen; closely tied to
rigpaand'od gsal. The four Dzogchen liberations (grol bzhi): -
rangdrol (Wylie: rang grol) (Dzogchen) — self-liberation; the general term for the Dzogchen mode of liberation.
-
shardrol (Wylie: shar grol) (Dzogchen) — liberation upon arising; thoughts and appearances liberate at their moment of arising, without intervening in the chain.
-
cherdrol (Wylie: gcer grol) (Dzogchen) — naked liberation, liberation upon nakedness; effortless liberation in raw awareness, without conceptual mediation.
-
yedrol (Wylie: ye grol) (Dzogchen) — primordial liberation; the already-liberated nature of mind, never bound.
-
jalü (Wylie: ‘ja’ lus) (Dzogchen) — rainbow body
-
gankyil (Wylie: dga’ ‘khyil) (Dzogchen) — wheel of joy; the tri-partite swirling symbol.
-
rangtong (Wylie: rang stong) — self-empty; the standard Madhyamaka reading — phenomena empty of own-nature; in Tibetan doxography especially associated with the Gelug systematization (Tsongkhapa-stream Prāsaṅgika), though rangtong-style readings are broader.
-
shentong (Wylie: gzhan stong) — other-empty; ultimate reality empty only of what is other than itself; a Tathāgatagarbha-inflected position; especially associated with the Jonang school (Dolpopa, Tāranātha), with reception-history strands in Kagyu and Nyingma as well.
-
trekchö (Wylie: khregs chod) (Dzogchen) — cutting through, breakthrough; one of the two principal Dzogchen practices (with tögal).
-
tögal (Wylie: thod rgal) (Dzogchen) — direct crossing, leap-over; the visionary / luminosity practice.
-
kadag (Wylie: ka dag) (Dzogchen) — primordial purity
-
lhundrub (Wylie: lhun grub) (Dzogchen) — spontaneous presence, self-accomplished
Part XIV — Vedānta & Indic Comparatives (Sanskrit)
Pāli surface cognates exist for several entries below (puruṣa/purisa, prakṛti/pakati, pratyakṣa/paccakkha, prāṇa/pāṇa, svarūpa/sarūpa) but the doctrinal usage here is Sanskrit-tradition only; the Pāli forms are not listed in parentheses.
XIV.a Vedānta
-
ātman — self, Self; the Upaniṣadic self-principle; contrasts with Buddhist
anātman(VI.a). -
brahman (n.) — brahman, the Absolute; the Upaniṣadic ground of reality. Advaita distinguishes
nirguṇa-brahman(brahman without qualities, the absolute) fromsaguṇa-brahman(brahman with qualities, identified withīśvara, the personal God). -
nirguṇa (Vedānta) — without qualities, unqualified; applied to brahman:
nirguṇa-brahman= brahman without qualities, the absolute ultimate beyond all attributes — the higher Advaita reading approached vianeti neti. Contrasts withsaguṇa-brahmanbelow. -
saguṇa (Vedānta) — with qualities, qualified; applied to brahman:
saguṇa-brahman= brahman conceived with attributes, identified withīśvara(the personal God) in Advaita; the lower / conditioned reading. -
nirvikalpa-samādhi (later Vedānta / post-classical yoga) — samādhi without conceptual distinction, non-conceptual samādhi.
-
savikalpa-samādhi (later Vedānta / post-classical yoga) — samādhi with conceptual distinction, conceptual samādhi. The savikalpa/nirvikalpa pair is widely used in later Vedānta and post-classical yoga literature; the classical Pātañjala Yogasūtra division is
samprajñāta/asamprajñātawith sub-typessavitarka/nirvitarka/savicāra/nirvicāra— see Sāṅkhya / Yoga sub-section below. -
Brahmā (m.) — Brahmā; the personified creator deity.
-
īśvara — Lord, the personal God; central in Viśiṣṭādvaita and the Yogasūtra; in Advaita, saguṇa-brahman (brahman-with-qualities).
-
advaita (Vedānta — Advaita) — non-dualism, non-duality; lit. “not-two”
-
dvaita (Vedānta — Dvaita) — dualism; lit. “two-ness”
-
viśiṣṭādvaita (Vedānta — Viśiṣṭādvaita) — qualified non-dualism; lit. “non-dualism-with-distinction”
-
Vedānta — Vedānta; lit. “end / culmination of the Vedas”
-
Veda / Vedas — Veda(s), revealed knowledge; lit. “knowledge” (√vid)
-
Upaniṣad / Upaniṣads — Upaniṣad(s); lit. “sitting down near” (a teacher, for esoteric instruction)
-
śruti — that which is heard, revealed scripture; the Vedas + Upaniṣads as divinely-heard texts.
-
smṛti — that which is remembered, tradition; in the Vedic-canonical sense (contrasts with
śruti). Cf. III/IV for the meditativesati/smṛti. -
tat tvam asi — “you are that” (Chāndogya Upaniṣad 6.8.7, etc.); one of the four mahāvākyas.
-
so’ham — “I am he / that”; abbreviated contemplative formula.
-
ahaṃ brahmāsmi — “I am brahman” (Bṛhadāraṇyaka 1.4.10); another mahāvākya.
-
neti neti — “not this, not this”; the foundational apophatic formula from the Bṛhadāraṇyaka Upaniṣad — primary locus BU 2.3.6 (
athāta ādeśo neti neti), recurring at BU 3.9.26, 4.2.4, 4.4.22, 4.5.15 in the formulasa eṣa neti nety ātmā. Brahman / ātman characterized only by what it is not. Structural parallel to Buddhist negation-of-self (na me so attā) and to the Christian apophatic tradition (cf. XV.aapophasis,hyperousia). -
oṃkāra — the syllable Oṃ; lit. “the making / uttering of Oṃ”
-
praṇava — the primordial sound; a synonym for Oṃ; lit. “the praising / sounding-forth” (pra- + √nu).
-
udgītha — the high-chant; the chanted portion of Sāmavedic recitation; a major Chāndogya meditation object.
-
turīya — “the fourth”; not a fourth empirical state in the same series as waking, dreaming, and deep sleep, but the non-dual witnessing/reality underlying or transcending the three (Māṇḍūkya Up. 7). In Advaita, turīya is ātman, and ātman is brahman.
-
svarūpa — own-form, essential nature, intrinsic form; structurally parallel to Sanskrit
svabhāva(XII.b) — own-nature — but in Advaita used affirmatively for brahman’s essential nature rather than as a target of critique. -
cidākāśa — consciousness-space, space of consciousness
-
Hiraṇyagarbha — the Golden Embryo / Golden Womb; the cosmogonic principle of Vedic-Upaniṣadic thought.
-
saccidānanda — being-consciousness-bliss; Advaita’s tri-partite characterization of brahman.
-
sat — being, existence, that-which-is; component of saccidānanda.
-
cit — consciousness, awareness; component of saccidānanda.
-
ānanda — bliss; component of saccidānanda.
-
māyā — illusion, cosmic appearance-power; core Advaita category for the world’s dependent-appearance status vis-à-vis brahman.
-
avidyā — ignorance (Advaita sense).
def-flag: Advaita uses
avidyāfor metaphysical ignorance-as-cause-of-superimposition of world on brahman. The Buddhistavijjā/avidyā(DO link 1; fetter 10 — see VII.a, VIII.g) is canonically defined as ignorance of the four noble truths (SN 12.2); vipassanā-pedagogical framing extends this to ignorance of the three marks (anicca, dukkha, anattā); Mahāyāna framings read it as ignorance of emptiness — mistaking dependently-arisen phenomena for inherently-existing ones. The three Buddhist framings are nested refinements of the same fundamental misperception. Same IAST word, two doctrinal contexts (Advaita / Buddhism) — handled here as a split entry (cf.sabhāvaXI.a vssvabhāvaXII.b). -
adhyāsa — superimposition; Śaṅkara’s preamble to the Brahmasūtrabhāṣya frames the root epistemic error as mutual superimposition of ātman and anātman.
-
upādhi — limiting adjunct.
def-flag: Advaita “limiting adjunct” — that which makes the one brahman appear as many. Distinct from Pāli
upadhi(I) — different Sanskrit words (upa-ā-√dhā vs. upa-√dhā); the macron is the tell. -
sākṣin / sākṣi-caitanya — witness, witness-consciousness; the uninvolved awareness in which experience appears. A distinctive Advaita category.
-
jīvanmukta / jīvanmukti — one-liberated-while-living / liberation-while-living; the Advaita doctrine that mokṣa can obtain while the body persists.
-
videhamukti — liberation at death, bodiless liberation; paired with jīvanmukti.
-
ahaṃkāra — I-maker, ego-principle; ego-principle in the Sāṅkhya-Vedānta psychological hierarchy.
-
buddhi — intellect, discriminating faculty; Sāṅkhya-Vedānta.
-
manas — mind, sensory-coordinating faculty; Sāṅkhya-Vedānta sense; distinct from the Buddhist
manoat VI.c. -
antaḥkaraṇa — inner instrument; the four-fold psychological apparatus (manas, buddhi, ahaṃkāra, citta).
-
ajāti-vāda (Vedānta — Advaita) — the doctrine of non-origination; Gauḍapāda’s claim in the Māṇḍūkya-kārikā (esp. book IV
Alātaśānti) that nothing ever truly comes into being; apparent arising of a world is unreal. Structurally parallel to — and likely absorbing premises from — Madhyamaka’s critique of origination (XII.b), while redirecting the conclusion toward non-dual brahman rather than śūnyatā.
Yogas (paths of practice):
- bhakti-yoga (Vedānta) — devotion; loving devotion to a personal deity, the path of the Bhagavad-Gītā and of the later devotional traditions.
- karma-yoga (Vedānta) — the yoga of action; selfless action without attachment to its fruits (niṣkāma-karma), as taught in the Gītā.
- jñāna-yoga (Vedānta) — the yoga of knowledge; discriminative realization of brahman–ātman identity. In classical Advaita the identity holds for ātman stripped of upādhi (not jīva, ahaṃkāra, body-mind, or empirical self-experience); in Nisargadatta-style teaching language the manifest “I am” / witness-consciousness functions as a doorway to the Absolute but is itself transcended (Parabrahman is prior to even consciousness). Path of
vivekaand the three-stageśravaṇa-manana-nididhyāsana(both below); Advaita’s path par excellence. Cf. XIV.cjñānafor the underlying term.
Method-vocabulary of jñāna-yoga:
- viveka (Vedānta) — discrimination, discernment; in Advaita, specifically
nitya-anitya-vastu-viveka(“discrimination between the eternal and the non-eternal”), the first of Śaṅkara’s four prerequisites (sādhana-catuṣṭaya) for liberating knowledge. Distinct from the Pālivivekaat III.c (“separation,” the jhāna-formula sense) — same word, different doctrinal use. - śravaṇa-manana-nididhyāsana (Vedānta) — hearing, reflecting, meditating; Śaṅkara’s three-stage epistemic procedure on Bṛhadāraṇyaka 2.4.5 (
ātmā vā are draṣṭavyaḥ śrotavyo mantavyo nididhyāsitavyaḥ): hearing the teaching from a guru / from śruti (śravaṇa), reflecting on it (manana), and sustained contemplation toward direct realization (nididhyāsana). The standard Advaita pedagogy of jñāna-yoga.
XIV.b Sāṅkhya / Yoga
- puruṣa (Sāṅkhya) — spirit, pure consciousness, the conscious principle
- prakṛti (Sāṅkhya) — nature, primordial matter, the unconscious-material principle
- guṇa (Sāṅkhya) — quality, strand; the three strands constituting prakṛti.
The Three Guṇas:
- sattva (Sāṅkhya) — lucidity, clarity, goodness
- rajas (Sāṅkhya) — passion, activity
- tamas (Sāṅkhya) — inertia, dullness, darkness
- vyakta (Sāṅkhya) — manifest
- avyakta (Sāṅkhya) — unmanifest; the equilibrium-state of prakṛti before manifestation. In the Bhagavad-Gītā and Vedānta, avyakta is variously absorbed depending on commentator and verse — often as unmanifest prakṛti / māyā, sometimes as
akṣara, sometimes as a brahmanic register. In classical Sāṅkhya it is prakṛti-side, not brahman-side; Sāṅkhya is dualistic, and brahman is not a Sāṅkhya category. - kaivalya (Sāṅkhya / Yoga) — isolation, aloneness; the Sāṅkhya-Yoga goal: puruṣa’s separation from prakṛti.
- samprajñāta-samādhi / asamprajñāta-samādhi (Pātañjala Yoga) — samādhi with / without cognized object; the two-fold division at YS 1.17–1.18. YS 1.17 characterizes
samprajñātaas accompanied byvitarka,vicāra,ānanda, andasmitā; YS 1.42–1.44 then elaborates thesavitarka/nirvitarkaandsavicāra/nirvicārasamāpatti distinctions. - prāṇa — breath, life-force, vital energy
- kuṇḍalinī (Hindu tantra / Haṭha-yoga) — coiled (serpent-energy); not Sāṅkhya / Pātañjala-Yoga vocabulary — a Hindu-tantric and Haṭha-yoga concept (developed in the Śaiva and Nātha tantric corpora, codified in the Haṭhayogapradīpikā and similar texts) of dormant energy at the base of the spine, raised through the central channel in subtle-body practice. Listed here under Indic comparatives for its structural parallel to Vajrayāna
caṇḍālī(XIII.a) / Tibetantummo(XIII.b).
XIV.c Epistemology (pan-Indic)
- pramāṇa — means of valid knowledge, instrument of cognition; systems differ on which and how many pramāṇas are admitted — e.g. Nyāya accepts four (perception, inference, comparison, verbal testimony), Advaita six (adding postulation and non-apprehension), the Cārvāka only direct perception.
Core pramāṇas (common to most systems):
- pratyakṣa — direct perception; lit. “before-the-eye”
- anumāna — inference
- śabda — verbal testimony, authoritative word; (in epistemology); the same word as “sound” generally — cf. VI.c.
- vikalpa — conceptualization, mental construct, discriminative thought
- nirvikalpa — without conceptualization, non-conceptual
- paryudāsa / prasajya-pratiṣedha — implicative (choice) negation and non-implicative (sheer) negation; the two negation-types in Sanskrit grammatical-logical analysis.
paryudāsa(“not-X but Y”) denies X while implying a positive alternative;prasajya-pratiṣedha(“not X at all”) denies X without implication. Originating in Pāṇinian grammar and Mīmāṃsā exegesis; doctrinally consequential in Madhyamaka (XII.b), where Nāgārjuna’s prasaṅga method is read as deployingprasajya-pratiṣedhato negate svabhāva without reifying its absence as a positive thesis. - jñāna (Pāli: ñāṇa) — knowledge, cognition; cf. VI.f.
XIV.d Ethics / Other
- ahiṃsā — non-harming, non-violence; lit. “non-injuring”
- dharma — order, duty, righteousness (pan-Indic sense); cf. XI.a for the Abhi. technical sense.
Part XV — Non-Indic Philosophical / Mystical Comparatives (Greek, Hebrew, German)
Comparative entries below are included as orientation aids, not equivalence claims. They flag partial structural, phenomenological, or pedagogical resonances — not shared metaphysics, identical soteriology, or direct historical dependence. Where a structural-only analogy is at issue (e.g., kenosis / śūnyatā, ayin / śūnyatā, Gelassenheit / virāga, apatheia / upekkhā), the entry says so; where historical influence is plausible, it is flagged inline.
XV.a Greek
Platonic / Neoplatonic principles (Plotinus, Proclus, Pseudo-Dionysius):
- to hen (τὸ ἕν) (Plotinian) — the One; Plotinus’s first and highest principle, beyond being and beyond predication (Enneads VI.9). Cf.
brahman(XIV.a) as non-dual ground. - nous (νοῦς) (Plotinian) — intellect, mind, intelligence; the second hypostasis — first emanation from the One, realm of the Platonic Forms.
- psychē (ψυχή) (Plotinian) — soul; the third hypostasis — world-soul and individual souls as its particularizations.
- hypostasis (ὑπόστασις) (Plotinian) — “standing-under,” subsistence, level-of-reality; Plotinus’s three principle-levels —
to hen,nous,psychē— are the three hypostases. Christian trinitarian theology later redeploys the term for the three divine persons in oneousia. - monad (μονάς) — one, unity, unit; Neoplatonic primal unity; Leibnizian metaphysical individual.
- ousia (οὐσία) (Aristotelian / Neoplatonic / Christian) — being, essence, substance; the Aristotelian category of what-something-is, redeployed in Christian trinitarian theology (three hypostases in one ousia) and inverted by
hyperousia.
Apophatic / beyond-being:
- hyperousia (ὑπερούσιος / ὑπερουσία) (Neoplatonic / Pseudo-Dionysius) — beyond being, superessential; the One’s transcendence of
ousia— not a being among beings, not the highest being. Central to Pseudo-Dionysius’s apophatic theology. - apophasis (ἀπόφασις) — negation, denial; the apophatic theological method — knowing God by what God is not.
Modes of knowing:
- noēsis (νόησις) (Platonic / Plotinian) — intellection, direct intellectual apprehension; the non-discursive knowing proper to
nous, contrasted withdianoia(διάνοια) — discursive step-by-step reasoning. - gnosis (γνῶσις) — knowledge (esp. spiritual / experiential knowledge); Greek cognate of Skt
jñāna/ Pāliñāṇa— all from PIE *ǵneh3- “know” (same root as English know, Latin cognoscere).
Contemplation, return, union:
- theōria (θεωρία) (Platonic / Neoplatonic) — contemplation, contemplative vision; engagement with the intelligible, contrasted with
praxis(practical activity); the Neoplatonic soteriological ideal. - epistrophē (ἐπιστροφή) (Plotinian / Proclean) — return, reversion; the soul’s turn back toward the One, reversing the outward
proodos(procession). Proclus’s triad:monē→proodos→epistrophē. - henōsis (ἕνωσις) (Plotinian) — union with the One; Plotinus’s soteriological goal — “the flight of the alone to the alone” (Enneads VI.9.11).
- theōsis (θέωσις) (Eastern Orthodox) — deification, divinization; the human person becomes “by grace what God is by nature” (Athanasius, Maximus, Palamas); the Christian-personalist redeployment of Plotinian
henōsis.
Love (the Platonic-Christian trio):
- eros (ἔρως) (Platonic) — desiring love, aspirational love; in Plato (
Symposium,Phaedrus), the soul’s ascent toward the Beautiful and the Good; in Plotinus, the soul’s drive-toward-the-One. - agape (ἀγάπη) — selfless / divine love; distinguished from
eros(desiring) andphilia(friendship).
Christian-mystical / Gnostic:
- plērōma (πλήρωμα) — fullness; Pauline cosmic fullness; Gnostic Pleroma as the totality of divine emanations.
- kenosis (κένωσις) — emptying, self-emptying; Philippians 2:7 on Christ’s self-emptying incarnation; semantic echo of
śūnyatā.
XV.b Hebrew (Kabbalah)
Divine absolute (beyond emanation):
- ein sof (אֵין סוֹף) — the Infinite, without-end; the hidden, unmanifest Godhead prior to the sefirot. An affirmative (though hidden) divine infinitude, not a predicate-stripped absence.
- ayin (אַיִן) — nothing, there-is-not; the Kabbalistic “divine nothingness” — especially in the Ḥasidic reading, Ein Sof as Ayin from the creaturely side. Names divine transcendence, not the absence of svabhāva.
The sefirot (the ten emanations through which Ein Sof manifests):
- sefirot (סְפִירוֹת; sing. sefirah) — emanations, numerations, divine attributes; the ten channels through which Ein Sof flows into manifestation; read as both divine self-structure and map of creation.
The Ten Sefirot (canonical order, from nearest-the-Infinite downward):
- keter (כֶּתֶר) — crown; the first sefirah, closest to Ein Sof; sometimes identified with Ayin.
- ḥokhmah (חָכְמָה) — wisdom; the second sefirah — flash-of-insight, pre-discursive.
- binah (בִּינָה) — understanding; the third sefirah — articulated comprehension; often paired with ḥokhmah as wisdom-unfolded.
- ḥesed (חֶסֶד) — loving-kindness, mercy; the fourth sefirah — outward-flowing grace.
- gevurah (גְּבוּרָה) — strength, severity, judgment; the fifth sefirah — the restraining / limiting aspect, paired with ḥesed.
- tifʾeret (תִּפְאֶרֶת) — beauty, harmony; the sixth sefirah — the balanced center of the tree, harmonizing ḥesed and gevurah.
- netzaḥ (נֶצַח) — victory, eternity, endurance; the seventh sefirah.
- hod (הוֹד) — splendor, majesty, acknowledgment; the eighth sefirah; paired with netzaḥ.
- yesod (יְסוֹד) — foundation; the ninth sefirah — the channel gathering the flow toward malkhut.
- malkhut (מַלְכוּת) — kingdom, sovereignty; the tenth sefirah — the manifest world / receiving-vessel; frequently identified with Shekhinah.
Divine immanence, mystical union:
- shekhinah (שְׁכִינָה) — divine presence, indwelling; God’s immanent / dwelling aspect; often feminine-coded and identified with the tenth sefirah malkhut. In exile with Israel in post-biblical Jewish thought.
- devekut (דְּבֵקוּת) — cleaving, adherence (to God); mystical union via continuous cleaving to the divine — the central soteriological term in Ḥasidism.
XV.c German
- Erleuchtung — enlightenment, illumination
- Aufklärung — the (European) Enlightenment
- Istigkeit (Eckhart) — is-ness, is-ity; Meister Eckhart’s neologism for the sheer being-of-things.
- Gelassenheit (Eckhart / Heidegger) — releasement, letting-be, equanimity; Eckhart: detachment as spiritual posture; Heidegger: a stance toward technology and Being.
- Ungrund (Böhme) — un-ground, abyss; Jacob Böhme’s term for the groundless ground of divine reality prior to any determinate being.
Notes:
- Pāli headwords always carry
(Skt: …)—(Skt: same)when IAST-identical. - Part titles carry
(language; stratum). Anomalous terms get inline stratum tags. - Entries give brief glosses and rendering-notes rather than full prose definitions. Def-flags surface contested scholarship or multi-sense terms.
- Sanskrit -an stem nouns use the technical stem (
ātman,karman,brahman,nāman), not popular shortened forms. In compounds the -n drops by sandhi (nāma-rūpa,brahma-vihāra).
Index
Alphabetical index of all headwords across Parts I–XV. Primary entries are in bold; cross-references from Sanskrit or Pāli equivalents are in italics and point to the primary entry. Location abbreviations are the Part + subsection (e.g. VI.b). Terms with multiple appearances list all locations. Sort is alphabetical by Pāli / primary form, diacritics folded.
A
- abhidhyā-daurmanasya → see abhijjhā-domanassa (IV)
- abhijjhā-domanassa (Skt: abhidhyā-daurmanasya) — IV
- abhijñā → see abhiññā (III.a)
- abhiññā (Skt: abhijñā) — III.a
- abhiṣeka — XIII.a
- adhicitta — III.a
- adhipaññā (Skt: adhiprajñā) — III.a
- adhiprajñā → see adhipaññā (III.a)
- adhisīla (Skt: adhiśīla) — III.a
- adhyāsa — XIV.a
- ādīnavānupaśyanā-jñāna → see ādīnavānupassanā-ñāṇa (XI.b)
- ādīnavānupassanā-ñāṇa (Skt: ādīnavānupaśyanā-jñāna) — XI.b
- adosa (Skt: adveṣa) — VI.f
- advaita — XIV.a
- adveṣa → see adosa (VI.f)
- agape — XV.a
- ahaṃ brahmāsmi — XIV.a
- ahaṃkāra — XIV.a
- ahiṃsā — XIV.d
- ajāti-vāda — XIV.a
- ākāsa-dhātu (Skt: ākāśa-dhātu) — VI.d
- ākāsānañcāyatana (Skt: ākāśānantyāyatana) — III.c
- ākāśānantyāyatana → see ākāsānañcāyatana (III.c)
- akiñcana — I
- ākiñcañña (Skt: ākiñcanya) — I
- ākiñcaññāyatana (Skt: ākiṃcanyāyatana) — III.c
- ākiñcanya → see ākiñcañña (I)
- ākiṃcanyāyatana → see ākiñcaññāyatana (III.c)
- akusala (Skt: akuśala) — III.a
- akusala-mūla (Skt: akuśala-mūla) — VI.f
- ālayavijñāna — XII.c
- alobha — VI.f
- amata (Skt: amṛta) — II
- amoha — VI.f
- amṛta → see amata (II)
- anāgāmī (Skt: anāgāmin) — VIII.g
- anāgāmin → see anāgāmī (VIII.g)
- ānanda — XIV.a
- ānāpānasati (Skt: ānāpānasmṛti) — IV
- ānāpānasmṛti → see ānāpānasati (IV)
- anāsava (Skt: anāsrava) — II
- anāsrava → see anāsava (II)
- anātman → see anattā (VI.a)
- anattā (Skt: anātman) — VI.a
- anicca (Skt: anitya) — VI.a
- animitta — II
- aniśrita → see anissita (X.a)
- anissita (Skt: aniśrita) — X.a
- anitya → see anicca (VI.a)
- antaḥkaraṇa — XIV.a
- anuloma-jñāna → see anuloma-ñāṇa (XI.b)
- anuloma-ñāṇa (Skt: anuloma-jñāna) — XI.b
- anumāna — XIV.c
- anupādāna — X.a
- anupadhi — I
- anupādisesa-nibbāna (Skt: nirupadhiśeṣa-nirvāṇa) — II
- anupaśyanā → see anupassanā (IV)
- anupassanā (Skt: anupaśyanā) — IV
- anusmṛti → see anussati (XI.b)
- anussati (Skt: anusmṛti) — XI.b
- anuttara-samyak-saṃbodhi — XII.d
- ap-dhātu → see āpo-dhātu (VI.d)
- apatrāpya → see ottappa (III.a)
- āpo-dhātu (Skt: ap-dhātu) — VI.d
- apophasis — XV.a
- appamāda (Skt: apramāda) — III.a
- appamāṇā (Skt: apramāṇa) — V
- appanā-samādhi (Skt: arpaṇā-samādhi) — XI.b
- appaṇihita (Skt: apraṇihita) — II
- apramāda → see appamāda (III.a)
- apramāṇa → see appamāṇā (V)
- apraṇihita → see appaṇihita (II)
- apratiṣṭhita — XII.b
- arahant (Skt: arhat) — VIII.g
- arhat → see arahant (VIII.g)
- ariya-puggala (Skt: ārya-pudgala) — VIII.g
- ariyasacca (Skt: āryasatya) — IX
- arpaṇā-samādhi → see appanā-samādhi (XI.b)
- arūpa — VI.e
- arūpa-rāga (Skt: ārūpya-rāga) — VIII.g
- arūpa-samāpatti (Skt: ārūpya-samāpatti) — III.c
- arūpāvacara (Skt: ārūpyāvacara) — XI.a
- ārūpya-rāga → see arūpa-rāga (VIII.g)
- ārūpya-samāpatti → see arūpa-samāpatti (III.c)
- ārūpyāvacara → see arūpāvacara (XI.a)
- ārya-pudgala → see ariya-puggala (VIII.g)
- āryasatya → see ariyasacca (IX)
- asabhāva (Skt: asvabhāva) — XI.a
- aśaikṣa → see asekha (VIII.g)
- asamprajñāta-samādhi → see samprajñāta-samādhi (XIV.b)
- asaṃskṛta → see asaṅkhata (VII.b)
- asaṅkhata (Skt: asaṃskṛta) — VII.b
- āsava (Skt: āsrava) — II
- āsavakkhaya (Skt: āsravakṣaya) — II
- asekha (Skt: aśaikṣa) — VIII.g
- āsrava → see āsava (II)
- āsravakṣaya → see āsavakkhaya (II)
- āśraya-parāvṛtti — XII.c
- aṣṭa-vijñāna — XII.c
- asubha (Skt: aśubha) — XI.b
- asvabhāva → see asabhāva (XI.a)
- atammayatā (Skt: atanmayatā) — X.a
- atanmayatā → see atammayatā (X.a)
- ātāpī (Skt: ātāpin) — IV
- ātāpin → see ātāpī (IV)
- ātman — XIV.a
- auddhatya → see uddhacca (VIII.g)
- auddhatya-kaukṛtya → see uddhacca-kukkucca (III.b)
- Aufklärung — XV.c
- avidyā → see avijjā (VII.a, VIII.g)
- avidyā — XIV.a
- avijjā (Skt: avidyā) — VII.a, VIII.g
- avyākata (Skt: avyākṛta) — X.b
- avyākṛta → see avyākata (X.b)
- avyakta — XIV.b
- āyatana — VI.c
- ayin — XV.b
B
- bala — VIII.d
- bardo — XIII.b
- běnlái miànmù — XII.e
- bhakti-yoga — XIV.a
- bhaṅga-jñāna → see bhaṅga-ñāṇa (XI.b)
- bhaṅga-ñāṇa (Skt: bhaṅga-jñāna) — XI.b
- bhava — VII.a
- bhāvanā — III.a, IX
- bhavaṅga (Skt: bhavāṅga) — XI.a
- bhayopasthāna-jñāna → see bhayatupaṭṭhāna-ñāṇa (XI.b)
- bhayatupaṭṭhāna-ñāṇa (Skt: bhayopasthāna-jñāna) — XI.b
- bīja — XII.c
- binah — XV.b
- bodhi — II
- bodhicitta — XII.d
- bodhipakkhiyā dhammā (Skt: bodhipakṣa-dharma) — VIII
- bodhipakṣa-dharma → see bodhipakkhiyā dhammā (VIII)
- bodhisattva — XII.d
- bodhisattvayāna — XII.d
- bodhyaṅga → see bojjhaṅga (VIII.b)
- bojjhaṅga (Skt: bodhyaṅga) — VIII.b
- Brahmā — XIV.a
- brahman — XIV.a
- brahmavihāra — V
- buddha-kṣetra — XII.d
- buddhadhātu — XII.d
- buddhi — XIV.a
C
- caitasika / caitta → see cetasika (XI.a)
- cakkhu (Skt: cakṣus) — VI.c
- cakṣus → see cakkhu (VI.c)
- cattāri ariyasaccāni (Skt: catvāri āryasatyāni) — IX
- catutthajjhāna — III.c
- catuṣkoṭi — XII.b
- catvāri āryasatyāni → see cattāri ariyasaccāni (IX)
- cetanā — VI.f
- cetasika (Skt: caitasika / caitta) — XI.a
- cetovimukti → see cetovimutti (II)
- cetovimutti (Skt: cetovimukti) — II
- chanda — VI.f, VIII.f
- cherdrol — XIII.b
- cidākāśa — XIV.a
- cit — XIV.a
- citta — VI.f, VIII.f
- cittamātra — XII.c
- cittānupassanā (Skt: cittānupaśyanā) — IV
- cittānupaśyanā → see cittānupassanā (IV)
- cittavīthi (Skt: cittavīthī) — XI.a
D
- ḍākinī — XIII.a
- dāna-pāramitā — XII.d
- daśa-bhūmi — XII.d
- daurmanasya → see domanassa (VI.f)
- devekut — XV.b
- dhamma (Skt: dharma) — VI.c (EBT), XI.a (Abhi.)
- dhamma-vicaya (Skt: dharma-pravicaya) — VIII.b
- dhammakāya → see dharmakāya (XII.d)
- dhammānupassanā (Skt: dharmānupaśyanā) — IV
- dhāraṇī — XII.d
- dharma → see dhamma (VI.c, XI.a)
- dharma — XIV.d
- dharma-nairātmya — XII.b
- dharma-pravicaya → see dhamma-vicaya (VIII.b)
- dharmadhātu — XII.c
- dharmakāya (Pāli: dhammakāya) — XII.d
- dharmānupaśyanā → see dhammānupassanā (IV)
- dharmatā — XII.c
- dhātu — VI.d
- dhyāna → see jhāna (III.c)
- dhyāna-pāramitā — XII.d
- diṭṭhi (Skt: dṛṣṭi) — I
- domanassa (Skt: daurmanasya) — VI.f
- dosa (Skt: dveṣa) — VI.f
- dṛṣṭi → see diṭṭhi (I)
- duḥkha → see dukkha (I, VI.a)
- duḥkha-satya → see dukkha-sacca (IX)
- dukkha (Skt: duḥkha) — I, VI.a
- dukkha-sacca (Skt: duḥkha-satya) — IX
- dutiyajjhāna — III.c
- dvaita — XIV.a
- dvāra — XI.a
- dve satye — XII.b
- dveṣa → see dosa (VI.f)
- dzogchen — XIII.b
E
- ein sof — XV.b
- ekaggatā (Skt: ekāgratā) — III.c
- ekāgratā → see ekaggatā (III.c)
- ekayāna — XII.d
- ekodibhāva (Skt: ekotibhāva) — III.c
- ekotibhāva → see ekodibhāva (III.c)
- epistrophē — XV.a
- Erleuchtung — XV.c
- eros — XV.a
G
- gandha — VI.c
- gankyil — XIII.b
- Gelassenheit — XV.c
- gevurah — XV.b
- ghāna (Skt: ghrāṇa) — VI.c
- ghrāṇa → see ghāna (VI.c)
- gnosis — XV.a
- gōngàn — XII.e
- gotrabhū-jñāna → see gotrabhū-ñāṇa (XI.b)
- gotrabhū-ñāṇa (Skt: gotrabhū-jñāna) — XI.b
- guṇa — XIV.b
- guru — XIII.a
H
- henōsis — XV.a
- ḥesed — XV.b
- hetu — VII.b
- hīnayāna — XII.d
- Hiraṇyagarbha — XIV.a
- hiri (Skt: hrī) — III.a
- hishiryō — XII.e
- hod — XV.b
- ḥokhmah — XV.b
- honraino menmoku → see běnlái miànmù (XII.e)
- hrī → see hiri (III.a)
- hyperousia — XV.a
- hypostasis — XV.a
I
- idaṃpratyayatā → see idappaccayatā (VII.a)
- idappaccayatā (Skt: idaṃpratyayatā) — VII.a
- iddhi (Skt: ṛddhi) — VIII.f
- iddhipāda (Skt: ṛddhipāda) — VIII.f
- indriya — VIII.c
- indriya-saṃvara — III.a
- Istigkeit — XV.c
- īśvara — XIV.a
J
- jalü — XIII.b
- jarā-maraṇa — VII.a
- jāti — VII.a
- javana — XI.a
- jhāna (Skt: dhyāna) — III.c
- jihvā → see jivhā (VI.c)
- jīva — VI.e
- jīvanmukta — XIV.a
- jīvanmukti — XIV.a
- jivhā (Skt: jihvā) — VI.c
- jñāna → see ñāṇa (VI.f)
- jñāna (Pāli: ñāṇa) — XIV.c
- jñāna-yoga — XIV.a
K
- kadag — XIII.b
- kaivalya — XIV.b
- kalāpa — XI.a
- kalyāṇa-mitta (Skt: kalyāṇa-mitra) — III.a
- kalyāṇa-mittatā (Skt: kalyāṇa-mitratā) — III.a
- kāma-rāga — VIII.g
- kāmacchanda — III.b
- kāmāvacara — XI.a
- kamma (Skt: karman) — VII.b
- karma-yoga — XIV.a
- karman → see kamma (VII.b)
- karuṇā — V
- kasiṇa (Skt: kṛtsna) — XI.b
- kāya — VI.c
- kāyagatāsati (Skt: kāyagatāsmṛti) — IV
- kāyagatāsmṛti → see kāyagatāsati (IV)
- kāyānupassanā (Skt: kāyānupaśyanā) — IV
- kāyānupaśyanā → see kāyānupassanā (IV)
- kenosis — XV.a
- kenshō — XII.e
- keter — XV.b
- khandha (Skt: skandha) — VI.b
- khaṇika-samādhi (Skt: kṣaṇika-samādhi) — XI.b
- khīṇāsava (Skt: kṣīṇāsrava) — II
- kliṣṭa-manas — XII.c
- kōan → see gōngàn (XII.e)
- kṛtsna → see kasiṇa (XI.b)
- kṣaṇika-samādhi → see khaṇika-samādhi (XI.b)
- kṣānti-pāramitā — XII.d
- kṣīṇāsrava → see khīṇāsava (II)
- kuṇḍalinī — XIV.b
- kusala (Skt: kuśala) — III.a
- kusala-mūla (Skt: kuśala-mūla) — VI.f
L
- lama — XIII.b
- lhundrub — XIII.b
- lobha — VI.f
- lokottara → see lokuttara (XI.a)
- lokuttara (Skt: lokottara) — XI.a
M
- ma rigpa — XIII.b
- madhyamā pratipad → see majjhimā paṭipadā (III.a)
- madhyamaka — XII.b
- mādhyamika — XII.b
- magga (Skt: mārga) — VIII.g
- magga-ñāṇa (Skt: mārga-jñāna) — XI.b
- magga-phala (Skt: mārga-phala) — VIII.g
- magga-sacca (Skt: mārga-satya) — IX
- mahāmudrā — XIII.a
- mahāsiddha — XIII.a
- mahāsukha — XIII.a
- mahāyāna — XII.d
- maitrī → see mettā (V)
- majjhimā paṭipadā (Skt: madhyamā pratipad) — III.a
- malkhut — XV.b
- māna — VIII.g
- manas → see mano (VI.c)
- manas — XIV.a
- manasikāra — VI.f
- maṇḍala — XIII.a
- mano (Skt: manas) — VI.c
- manovijñāna — XII.c
- mantra — XIII.a
- mārga → see magga (VIII.g)
- mārga-jñāna → see magga-ñāṇa (XI.b)
- mārga-phala → see magga-phala (VIII.g)
- mārga-satya → see magga-sacca (IX)
- mauneya → see moneyya (I)
- māyā — XIV.a
- mettā (Skt: maitrī) — V
- mīmāṃsā → see vīmaṃsā (VIII.f)
- moha — VI.f
- mokkha (Skt: mokṣa) — II
- mokṣa → see mokkha (II)
- monad — XV.a
- moneyya (Skt: mauneya) — I
- mu — XII.e
- muditā — V
- mudrā — XIII.a
- mukti → see mutti (II)
- mumukṣā-jñāna → see muñcitukamyatā-ñāṇa (XI.b)
- muñcitukamyatā-ñāṇa (Skt: mumukṣā-jñāna) — XI.b
- muni — I
- mushin → see wúxīn (XII.e)
- mutti (Skt: mukti) — II
N
- nairātmya — XII.b
- naiṣkramya → see nekkhamma (III.a)
- naivasaṃjñānāsaṃjñāyatana → see nevasaññānāsaññāyatana (III.c)
- nāma-rūpa — VI.e, VII.a
- nāma-rūpa-pariccheda-ñāṇa (Skt: nāma-rūpa-paricchedaka-jñāna) — XI.b
- nāma-rūpa-paricchedaka-jñāna → see nāma-rūpa-pariccheda-ñāṇa (XI.b)
- ñāṇa (Skt: jñāna) — VI.f
- ñāṇa → see jñāna (XIV.c)
- nekkhamma (Skt: naiṣkramya) — III.a
- neti neti — XIV.a
- netzaḥ — XV.b
- nevasaññānāsaññāyatana (Skt: naivasaṃjñānāsaṃjñāyatana) — III.c
- nibbāna (Skt: nirvāṇa) — II
- nibbidā (Skt: nirveda) — II
- nibbidānupassanā-ñāṇa (Skt: nirvedānupaśyanā-jñāna) — XI.b
- nidāna — VII.b
- niḥsvabhāva — XII.b
- nimitta — III.c
- nippapañca (Skt: niṣprapañca) — X.b
- nirguṇa — XIV.a
- nirmāṇakāya — XII.d
- nirodha — II
- nirodha-sacca (Skt: nirodha-satya) — IX
- nirodha-samāpatti — III.c
- nirodha-satya → see nirodha-sacca (IX)
- nirupadhi — I
- nirupadhiśeṣa-nirvāṇa → see anupādisesa-nibbāna (II)
- nirvāṇa → see nibbāna (II)
- nirveda → see nibbidā (II)
- nirvedānupaśyanā-jñāna → see nibbidānupassanā-ñāṇa (XI.b)
- nirvikalpa — XIV.c
- nirvikalpa-jñāna — XII.c
- nirvikalpa-samādhi — XIV.a
- niṣprapañca → see nippapañca (X.b)
- niṣprapañca — XII.b
- niśraya → see nissaya (X.a)
- niśrita → see nissita (X.a)
- nissaya (Skt: niśraya) — X.a
- nissita (Skt: niśrita) — X.a
- nīvaraṇa (Skt: nivāraṇa) — III.b
- noēsis — XV.a
- nous — XV.a
O
P
- pabhassara (Skt: prabhāsvara) — II
- paccavekkhaṇa-ñāṇa (Skt: pratyavekṣaṇā-jñāna) — XI.b
- paccaya (Skt: pratyaya) — VII.b
- paccaya-pariggaha-ñāṇa (Skt: pratyaya-parigraha-jñāna) — XI.b
- pahāna (Skt: prahāṇa) — IX
- pamāda (Skt: pramāda) — III.a
- pāmojja (Skt: prāmodya) — III.c
- pañca-dhyānāṅga → see pañca-jhānaṅga (XI.b)
- pañca-jhānaṅga (Skt: pañca-dhyānāṅga) — XI.b
- paññā (Skt: prajñā) — VI.f
- paññatti (Skt: prajñapti) — XI.a
- paññāvimutti (Skt: prajñāvimukti) — II
- paññindriya (Skt: prajñendriya) — VIII.c
- papañca (Skt: prapañca) — X.b
- paramārtha → see paramattha (XI.a)
- paramārtha-satya — XII.b
- paramattha (Skt: paramārtha) — XI.a
- pāramitā — XII.d
- paratantra-svabhāva — XII.c
- parikalpita-svabhāva — XII.c
- parikamma-nimitta (Skt: parikarma-nimitta) — XI.b
- parijñā → see pariññā (IX)
- parikarma-nimitta → see parikamma-nimitta (XI.b)
- pariṇāma — XII.c
- pariññā (Skt: parijñā) — IX
- parinibbāna (Skt: parinirvāṇa) — II
- parinirvāṇa → see parinibbāna (II)
- pariniṣpanna-svabhāva — XII.c
- paryudāsa — XIV.c
- pasāda / pasāda-rūpa (Skt: prasāda / prasāda-rūpa) — XI.a
- passaddhi (Skt: praśrabdhi) — VI.f, VIII.b
- paṭhamajjhāna — III.c
- pathavī-dhātu (Skt: pṛthivī-dhātu) — VI.d
- paṭibhāga-nimitta (Skt: pratibhāga-nimitta) — XI.b
- paṭiccasamuppāda (Skt: pratītyasamutpāda) — VII.a
- paṭigha (Skt: pratigha) — VIII.g
- paṭisaṅkhānupassanā-ñāṇa (Skt: pratisaṃkhyānupaśyanā-jñāna) — XI.b
- paṭṭhāna (Skt: prasthāna) — XI.a
- phala — VIII.g
- phala-jñāna → see phala-ñāṇa (XI.b)
- phala-ñāṇa (Skt: phala-jñāna) — XI.b
- phassa (Skt: sparśa) — VI.c, VII.a
- phoṭṭhabba (Skt: spraṣṭavya) — VI.c
- pīti (Skt: prīti) — III.c, VIII.b
- plērōma — XV.a
- prabhāsvara → see pabhassara (II)
- prabhāsvara-citta — XII.d
- prahāṇa → see pahāna (IX)
- prajñā → see paññā (VI.f)
- prajñā-pāramitā — XII.d
- prajñāpāramitā — XII.a
- prajñapti → see paññatti (XI.a)
- prajñāvimukti → see paññāvimutti (II)
- prajñendriya → see paññindriya (VIII.c)
- prakṛti — XIV.b
- pramāda → see pamāda (III.a)
- pramāṇa — XIV.c
- prāmodya → see pāmojja (III.c)
- prāṇa — XIV.b
- praṇava — XIV.a
- prapañca → see papañca (X.b)
- prasajya-pratiṣedha — XIV.c
- prasaṅga — XII.b
- prasāda / prasāda-rūpa → see pasāda / pasāda-rūpa (XI.a)
- Prāsaṅgika — XII.b
- praśrabdhi → see passaddhi (VI.f, VIII.b)
- prasthāna → see paṭṭhāna (XI.a)
- pratibhāga-nimitta → see paṭibhāga-nimitta (XI.b)
- pratigha → see paṭigha (VIII.g)
- pratisaṃkhyānupaśyanā-jñāna → see paṭisaṅkhānupassanā-ñāṇa (XI.b)
- pratītyasamutpāda → see paṭiccasamuppāda (VII.a)
- pratītyasamutpāda — XII.b
- pratyakṣa — XIV.c
- pratyavekṣaṇā-jñāna → see paccavekkhaṇa-ñāṇa (XI.b)
- pratyaya → see paccaya (VII.b)
- pratyaya-parigraha-jñāna → see paccaya-pariggaha-ñāṇa (XI.b)
- pratyekabuddhayāna — XII.d
- pravṛtti-vijñāna — XII.c
- prīti → see pīti (III.c, VIII.b)
- pṛthagjana → see puthujjana (VIII.g)
- pṛthivī-dhātu → see pathavī-dhātu (VI.d)
- psychē — XV.a
- pudgala-nairātmya — XII.b
- puruṣa — XIV.b
- puthujjana (Skt: pṛthagjana) — VIII.g
R
- rāga — VI.f
- rajas — XIV.b
- rangdrol — XIII.b
- rangtong — XIII.b
- rasa — VI.c
- ṛddhi → see iddhi (VIII.f)
- ṛddhipāda → see iddhipāda (VIII.f)
- rigpa — XIII.b
- rūpa — VI.b, VI.c, VI.e
- rūpa-kalāpa — XI.a
- rūpa-rāga — VIII.g
- rūpāvacara — XI.a
S
- śabda → see sadda (VI.c)
- śabda — XIV.c
- sabhāva (Skt: svabhāva) — XI.a
- sacca (Skt: satya) — IX
- sacchikiriyā (Skt: sākṣātkriyā) — IX
- saccidānanda — XIV.a
- ṣaḍāyatana → see saḷāyatana (VI.c, VII.a)
- sadda (Skt: śabda) — VI.c
- saddhā (Skt: śraddhā) — VI.f
- saddhindriya (Skt: śraddhendriya) — VIII.c
- sādhana — XIII.a
- saguṇa — XIV.a
- śaikṣa → see sekha (VIII.g)
- sakadāgāmī (Skt: sakṛdāgāmin) — VIII.g
- sakkāya-diṭṭhi (Skt: satkāya-dṛṣṭi) — VIII.g
- sakṛdāgāmin → see sakadāgāmī (VIII.g)
- sākṣi-caitanya — XIV.a
- sākṣin — XIV.a
- sākṣātkriyā → see sacchikiriyā (IX)
- saḷāyatana (Skt: ṣaḍāyatana) — VI.c, VII.a
- samādhi — III.c, VIII.b
- samādhindriya (Skt: samādhīndriya) — VIII.c
- samatha (Skt: śamatha) — III.c
- samaya — XIII.a
- sambhogakāya — XII.d
- saṃjñā → see saññā (VI.b)
- saṃjñāvedayitanirodha → see saññāvedayitanirodha (III.c)
- sammā-ājīva (Skt: samyag-ājīva) — VIII.a
- sammā-diṭṭhi (Skt: samyag-dṛṣṭi) — VIII.a
- sammā-kammanta (Skt: samyak-karmānta) — VIII.a
- sammā-samādhi (Skt: samyak-samādhi) — VIII.a
- sammā-sambodhi (Skt: samyak-saṃbodhi) — II
- sammā-saṅkappa (Skt: samyak-saṃkalpa) — VIII.a
- sammā-sati (Skt: samyak-smṛti) — VIII.a
- sammā-vācā (Skt: samyag-vāc) — VIII.a
- sammā-vāyāma (Skt: samyag-vyāyāma) — VIII.a
- sammappadhāna (Skt: samyakpradhāna) — VIII.e
- sammarśana-jñāna → see sammasana-ñāṇa (XI.b)
- sammasana-ñāṇa (Skt: sammarśana-jñāna) — XI.b
- sammuti (Skt: saṃvṛti) — XI.a
- sampajañña (Skt: samprajanya) — IV
- samprajanya → see sampajañña (IV)
- samprajñāta-samādhi / asamprajñāta-samādhi — XIV.b
- saṃsāra — II
- saṃskāra → see saṅkhāra (VI.b, VII.a, VII.b)
- saṃskāropekṣā-jñāna → see saṅkhārupekkhā-ñāṇa (XI.b)
- saṃskṛta → see saṅkhata (VII.b)
- saṃtuṣṭi → see santuṭṭhi (III.a)
- samudaya-sacca (Skt: samudaya-satya) — IX
- samudaya-satya → see samudaya-sacca (IX)
- saṃvṛti → see sammuti (XI.a)
- saṃvṛti-satya — XII.b
- samyag-ājīva → see sammā-ājīva (VIII.a)
- samyag-dṛṣṭi → see sammā-diṭṭhi (VIII.a)
- samyag-vāc → see sammā-vācā (VIII.a)
- samyag-vyāyāma → see sammā-vāyāma (VIII.a)
- samyak-karmānta → see sammā-kammanta (VIII.a)
- samyak-samādhi → see sammā-samādhi (VIII.a)
- samyak-saṃbodhi → see sammā-sambodhi (II)
- samyak-saṃkalpa → see sammā-saṅkappa (VIII.a)
- samyak-smṛti → see sammā-sati (VIII.a)
- samyakpradhāna → see sammappadhāna (VIII.e)
- saṅkhāra (Skt: saṃskāra) — VI.b, VII.a, VII.b
- saṅkhārupekkhā-ñāṇa (Skt: saṃskāropekṣā-jñāna) — XI.b
- saṅkhata (Skt: saṃskṛta) — VII.b
- saññā (Skt: saṃjñā) — VI.b
- saññāvedayitanirodha (Skt: saṃjñāvedayitanirodha) — III.c
- santi (Skt: śānti) — I
- santuṭṭhi (Skt: saṃtuṣṭi) — III.a
- sat — XIV.a
- sati (Skt: smṛti) — IV, VIII.b
- sati-sampajañña (Skt: smṛti-samprajanya) — III.a
- satindriya (Skt: smṛtīndriya) — VIII.c
- satipaṭṭhāna (Skt: smṛtyupasthāna) — IV
- satkāya-dṛṣṭi → see sakkāya-diṭṭhi (VIII.g)
- satori — XII.e
- sattva — XIV.b
- satya → see sacca (IX)
- saumanasya → see somanassa (VI.f)
- saupādisesa-nibbāna (Skt: sopadhiśeṣa-nirvāṇa) — II
- savikalpa-samādhi — XIV.a
- sefirah — XV.b
- sefirot — XV.b
- sekha (Skt: śaikṣa) — VIII.g
- sems nyid — XIII.b
- shardrol — XIII.b
- shekhinah — XV.b
- shentong — XIII.b
- shikantaza — XII.e
- siddha — XIII.a
- siddhi — XIII.a
- sīla (Skt: śīla) — III.a
- śīla-pāramitā — XII.d
- sīlabbata-parāmāsa (Skt: śīlavrata-parāmarśa) — VIII.g
- śīlavrata-parāmarśa → see sīlabbata-parāmāsa (VIII.g)
- skandha → see khandha (VI.b)
- smṛti → see sati (IV, VIII.b)
- smṛti — XIV.a
- smṛti-samprajanya → see sati-sampajañña (III.a)
- smṛtīndriya → see satindriya (VIII.c)
- smṛtyupasthāna → see satipaṭṭhāna (IV)
- so’ham — XIV.a
- somanassa (Skt: saumanasya) — VI.f
- sopadhiśeṣa-nirvāṇa → see saupādisesa-nibbāna (II)
- sota (Skt: śrotra) — VI.c
- sotāpanna (Skt: srotāpanna) — VIII.g
- sparśa → see phassa (VI.c, VII.a)
- spraṣṭavya → see phoṭṭhabba (VI.c)
- śraddhā → see saddhā (VI.f)
- śraddhendriya → see saddhindriya (VIII.c)
- śrāvakayāna — XII.d
- śravaṇa-manana-nididhyāsana — XIV.a
- srotāpanna → see sotāpanna (VIII.g)
- śrotra → see sota (VI.c)
- śruti — XIV.a
- styāna-middha → see thīna-middha (III.b)
- sukha — III.c
- suññatā (Skt: śūnyatā) — II
- śūnyatā → see suññatā (II)
- śūnyatā — XII.a (Prajñāpāramitā), XII.b (Madhyamaka)
- śūnyatā-śūnyatā — XII.b
- svabhāva → see sabhāva (XI.a)
- svabhāva — XII.b
- svarūpa — XIV.a
- svasaṃvedana — XII.c
- svasaṃvitti — XII.c
- svātantra — XII.b
- Svātantrika — XII.b
T
- tamas — XIV.b
- taṇhā (Skt: tṛṣṇā) — I, VII.a
- taṇhākkhaya (Skt: tṛṣṇākṣaya) — II
- tantra — XIII.a
- tat tvam asi — XIV.a
- tathāgatagarbha — XII.d
- tathatā — X.a (EBT), XII.a (Prajñāpāramitā)
- tatiyajjhāna — III.c
- tejas-dhātu → see tejo-dhātu (VI.d)
- tejo-dhātu (Skt: tejas-dhātu) — VI.d
- theōria — XV.a
- theōsis — XV.a
- thīna-middha (Skt: styāna-middha) — III.b
- tifʾeret — XV.b
- tiparivaṭṭa (Skt: triparivarta) — IX
- to hen — XV.a
- tögal — XIII.b
- trekchö — XIII.b
- trikāya — XII.d
- triparivarta → see tiparivaṭṭa (IX)
- trisvabhāva — XII.c
- tṛṣṇā → see taṇhā (I, VII.a)
- tṛṣṇākṣaya → see taṇhākkhaya (II)
- tulku — XIII.b
- turīya — XIV.a
U
- ubhatobhāgavimutta (Skt: ubhayatobhāgavimukta) — II
- ubhayatobhāgavimukta → see ubhatobhāgavimutta (II)
- udaya-vyaya-jñāna → see udayabbaya-ñāṇa (XI.b)
- udayabbaya-ñāṇa (Skt: udaya-vyaya-jñāna) — XI.b
- uddhacca (Skt: auddhatya) — VIII.g
- uddhacca-kukkucca (Skt: auddhatya-kaukṛtya) — III.b
- udgītha — XIV.a
- udgraha-nimitta → see uggaha-nimitta (XI.b)
- uggaha-nimitta (Skt: udgraha-nimitta) — XI.b
- Ungrund — XV.c
- upacāra-samādhi (Skt: upacāra-samādhi) — XI.b
- upādāna — I, VII.a
- upādāna-khandha (Skt: upādāna-skandha) — VI.b
- upādāna-skandha → see upādāna-khandha (VI.b)
- upadhi — I
- upādhi — XIV.a
- Upaniṣad — XIV.a
- Upaniṣads — XIV.a
- upāya — XII.d
- upāya-kauśalya — XII.d
- upekkhā (Skt: upekṣā) — V, VI.f, VIII.b
- upekṣā → see upekkhā (V, VI.f, VIII.b)
V
- vajra — XIII.a
- vajrayāna — XIII.a
- vāsanā — XII.c
- vāyo-dhātu (Skt: vāyu-dhātu) — VI.d
- vāyu-dhātu → see vāyo-dhātu (VI.d)
- Veda — XIV.a
- vedanā — VI.b, VII.a
- vedanānupassanā (Skt: vedanānupaśyanā) — IV
- vedanānupaśyanā → see vedanānupassanā (IV)
- Vedānta — XIV.a
- Vedas — XIV.a
- vicāra — III.c
- vicikicchā (Skt: vicikitsā) — III.b, VIII.g
- vicikitsā → see vicikicchā (III.b, VIII.g)
- videhamukti — XIV.a
- vijñāna → see viññāṇa (VI.b, VII.a)
- vijñāna-dhātu → see viññāṇa-dhātu (VI.d)
- vijñānānantyāyatana → see viññāṇañcāyatana (III.c)
- vijñānavāda — XII.c
- vijñaptimātra — XII.c
- vikalpa — XIV.c
- vīmaṃsā (Skt: mīmāṃsā) — VIII.f
- vimukti → see vimutti (II)
- vimukti-jñāna-darśana → see vimutti-ñāṇadassana (III.a)
- vimutti (Skt: vimukti) — II
- vimutti-ñāṇadassana (Skt: vimukti-jñāna-darśana) — III.a
- viññāṇa (Skt: vijñāna) — VI.b, VII.a
- viññāṇa-dhātu (Skt: vijñāna-dhātu) — VI.d
- viññāṇañcāyatana (Skt: vijñānānantyāyatana) — III.c
- vipāka — VII.b
- vipassanā (Skt: vipaśyanā) — III.c
- vipassanā-ñāṇa (Skt: vipaśyanā-jñāna) — XI.b
- vipaśyanā → see vipassanā (III.c)
- vipaśyanā-jñāna → see vipassanā-ñāṇa (XI.b)
- virāga — II
- vīriya (Skt: vīrya) — VI.f, VIII.b, VIII.f
- vīriyindriya (Skt: vīryendriya) — VIII.c
- vīrya → see vīriya (VI.f, VIII.b, VIII.f)
- vīrya-pāramitā — XII.d
- vīryendriya → see vīriyindriya (VIII.c)
- viśiṣṭādvaita — XIV.a
- visuddhi (Skt: viśuddhi) — XI.b
- vitakka (Skt: vitarka) — III.c
- vitarka → see vitakka (III.c)
- viveka — I, III.c, XIV.a
- vyakta — XIV.b
- vyāpāda — III.b
W
Y
- yāna — XII.d
- yathābhūta-jñāna-darśana → see yathābhūtaṃ ñāṇadassana (III.a)
- yathābhūtaṃ ñāṇadassana (Skt: yathābhūta-jñāna-darśana) — III.a
- yedrol — XIII.b
- yesod — XV.b
- yidam — XIII.b
- yogācāra — XII.c