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Bīja
In Hinduism, Jainism and Buddhism, the Sanskrit term Bīja () (Japanese language, Jp. 種子 ''shuji'') (Chinese language, Chinese 種子 ''zhǒngzǐ''), literally seed, is used as a metaphor for the origin or cause of things and cognate with bindu (symbol), bindu. Buddhist theory of karmic seeds Various schools of Buddhist thought held that karmic effects arose out of seeds that were latent in an individual's mindstream or psycho-physical continuum.Fukuda, Takumi. Bhadanta Rama: A Sautrantika before Vasubandhu, Journal of the International Association of Buddhist Studies, 26 (2), 2003. Rupert Gethin describes the theory thus: When I perform an action motivated by greed, it plants a 'seed' in the series of Dharma#Buddhism, dharmas [phenomena] that is my mind. Such a seed is not a thing in itself - a dharma but merely the modification or 'perfuming' of the subsequent flow of dharmas consequent upon the action. In the course of time this modification matures and issues in a particu ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bījamantra
A bījamantra (, in modern schwa-deleted Indo-Aryan languages: beej mantra), or a ''bījākṣara'' ("seed-syllable"), is a monosyllabic mantra believed to contain the essence of a given deity. They are found in Tantric Hinduism and in Esoteric Buddhism (Vajrayana / Mantrayana). A bījamantra is ritually uttered for the invocation of a deity. It is considered the true name of the deity as well as a manifestation of the deity in sonic form. It is also found in religious art, often standing for a specific deity. A bījamantra can be regarded to be a mystic sound made of the first few characters of a given deity's name, the chanting of which is regarded to allow an adherent to achieve a state of spiritual sanctity. These mantras are also associated with the chakras of the body. The Romanian scholar Mircea Eliade stated that an adherent who chants the semantically meaningless bījamantra "appropriates its ontological essence, concretely and directly assimilates with the god". ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Alaya
The Eight Consciousnesses (Skt. ''aṣṭa vijñānakāyāḥ'') are a classification developed in the tradition of the Yogācāra school of Mahayana Buddhism. They enumerate the five sense consciousnesses, supplemented by the mental consciousness (''manovijñāna''), the defiled mental consciousness (''kliṣṭamanovijñāna''), and finally the fundamental store-house consciousness (''ālāyavijñāna''), which is the basis of the other seven.Waldron, William S. The Buddhist Unconscious: The Alaya-vijñana in the context of Indian Buddhist Thought. Routledge Critical Studies in Buddhism, 2003, page 97 This eighth consciousness is said to store the impressions ('' vāsanāḥ'') of previous experiences, which form the seeds (''bīja'') of future karma in this life and in the next after rebirth. Eightfold network of primary consciousnesses All surviving schools of Buddhist thought accept – "in common" – the existence of the first six primary consciousn ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Yogacara
Yogachara (, IAST: ') is an influential tradition of Buddhist philosophy and psychology emphasizing the study of cognition, perception, and consciousness through the interior lens of meditation, as well as philosophical reasoning (hetuvidyā). Yogachara was one of the two most influential traditions of Mahayana, Mahayana Buddhism in India, along with Madhyamaka. The compound ''Yogācāra'' literally means "practice of yoga", or "one whose practice is yoga", hence the name of the school is literally "the school of the yogins". Yogācāra was also variously termed ''Vijñānavāda'' (the doctrine of consciousness), ''Vijñaptivāda'' (the doctrine of ideas or percepts) or ''Vijñaptimātratā-vāda'' (the doctrine of 'mere representation'), which is also the name given to its major theory of mind which seeks to deconstruct how we perceive the world. There are several interpretations of this main theory: various forms of Idealism, as well as a Phenomenology (philosophy), phenomen ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Matrikas
Matrikas (Sanskrit: मातृका (singular), IAST: mātṛkā, lit. "mothers") also called Mataras or Matri, are a group of mother goddesses in Hinduism. The Matrikas are often depicted in a group of seven, the Saptamatrika(s) (Seven Mothers). However, they are also depicted as a group of eight, the Ashtamatrika(s). In the '' Brihat Samhita'', Varahamihira says that "Matrikas are forms of Parvati taken by her with cognizance of (different major Hindu) gods corresponding to their names." They are associated with these gods as their energies (''Shaktis''). Brahmani emerged from Brahma, Vaishnavi from Vishnu, Maheshvari from Shiva, Indrani from Indra, Kaumari from Kartikeya, Varahi from Varaha and Chamunda from Chandi. And additionals are Narasimhi from Narasimha and Vinayaki from Ganesha. Originally the seven goddesses of the seven stars of the star cluster of the Pleiades, they became quite popular by the seventh century CE and a standard feature of the Hindu goddes ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Trikaya
The Trikāya (, lit. "three bodies"; , ) is a fundamental Buddhist doctrine that explains the multidimensional nature of Buddhahood. As such, the Trikāya is the basic theory of Mahayana Buddhist theology of Buddhahood. This concept posits that a Buddha has three distinct ''kayas'' or "bodies", aspects, or ways of being, each representing a different facet or embodiment of Buddhahood and ultimate reality. The three are the '' Dharmakāya'' (Sanskrit; Dharma body, the ultimate reality, the Buddha nature of all things), the ''Sambhogakāya'' (the body of self-enjoyment, a blissful divine body with infinite forms and powers) and the '' Nirmāṇakāya'' (manifestation body, the body which appears in the everyday world and presents the semblance of a human body). It is widely accepted in Buddhism that these three bodies are not separate realities, but functions, modes or "fluctuations" (Sanskrit: vṛṭṭis) of a single state of Buddhahood. The Trikāya doctrine explains how a Bu ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
A In Buddhism
Letter A in Siddham script The phoneme A ( Nagari: अ, Siddham: 𑖀) is an important symbol and seed mantra in Mahayana Buddhism as well as in Vajrayana Buddhism.Robert E. Buswell and Donald S. Lopez (2014). ''The Princeton Dictionary of Buddhism'', pp. 1, 24. Published by Princeton University Press In Mahayana A is the first vowel of the Sanskrit alphabet. Mahayana Buddhism invested the phoneme with mystical significance, associated with the doctrine of emptiness. In Sanskrit, when a is used as a prefix, it negates the meaning of a word. Thus, for example, ''svabhāva'', “with essence,” can be changed to ''asvabhāva'', “without essence.” The letter also came to signify the Mahayana teaching of Prajñāpāramitā (the Perfection of Wisdom). One of the Prajñāpāramitā sutras is the short ''The Perfection of Wisdom Mother in One Syllable'' (''ekākṣarīmātāprajñāpāramitā''). The sutra opens and closes lik ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Vasubandhu
Vasubandhu (; Tibetan: དབྱིག་གཉེན་ ; floruit, fl. 4th to 5th century CE) was an influential Indian bhikkhu, Buddhist monk and scholar. He was a philosopher who wrote commentary on the Abhidharma, from the perspectives of the Sarvastivada and Sautrāntika schools. After his conversion to Mahayana, Mahayana Buddhism, along with his brother, Asanga, he was also one of the main founders of the Yogacara school. Vasubandhu's ''Abhidharmakośakārikā'' ("Commentary on the Treasury of the Abhidharma") is widely used in Tibetan and East Asian Buddhism, as the major source for non-Mahayana Abhidharma philosophy. His philosophical verse works set forth the standard for the Indian Yogacara metaphysics of "appearance only" (''vijñapti-mātra''), which has been described as a form of "epistemological idealism", Phenomenology (philosophy), phenomenology and close to Immanuel Kant's transcendental idealism. Apart from this, he wrote several commentaries, works on logic, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hinduism
Hinduism () is an Hypernymy and hyponymy, umbrella term for a range of Indian religions, Indian List of religions and spiritual traditions#Indian religions, religious and spiritual traditions (Sampradaya, ''sampradaya''s) that are unified by adherence to the concept of ''dharma'', a Ṛta, cosmic order maintained by its followers through rituals and righteous living, as expounded in the Vedas. The word ''Hindu'' is an exonym, and while Hinduism has been called the oldest religion in the world, it has also been described by the modern term ''Sanātana Dharma'' () emphasizing its eternal nature. ''Vaidika Dharma'' () and ''Arya dharma'' are historical endonyms for Hinduism. Hinduism entails diverse systems of thought, marked by a range of shared Glossary of Hinduism terms, concepts that discuss God in Hinduism, theology, Hindu mythology, mythology, among other topics in Hindu texts, textual sources. Hindu texts have been classified into Śruti () and Smṛti (). The major Hin ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Kleshas (Buddhism)
Kleshas (; ''kilesa''; ''nyon mongs''), in Buddhism, are mental states that cloud the mind and manifest in unwholesome actions. ''Kleshas'' include states of mind such as anxiety, fear, anger, jealousy, desire, etc. Contemporary translators use a variety of English words to translate the term ''kleshas'', such as: afflictions, defilements, destructive emotions, disturbing emotions, negative emotions, mind poisons, and neuroses. In the contemporary Mahayana and Theravada Buddhist traditions, the three kleshas of ignorance, attachment, and aversion are identified as the root or source of all other kleshas. These are referred to as the ''three poisons'' in the Mahayana tradition, or as the three ''unwholesome roots'' in the Theravada tradition. While the early Buddhist texts of the Pali Canon do not specifically enumerate the three root kleshas, the ''three poisons'' (and the kleshas generally) came to be seen as the very roots of samsaric existence. Pali literature In the Pa ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Tibetan Buddhism
Tibetan Buddhism is a form of Buddhism practiced in Tibet, Bhutan and Mongolia. It also has a sizable number of adherents in the areas surrounding the Himalayas, including the Indian regions of Ladakh, Gorkhaland Territorial Administration, Darjeeling, Sikkim, and Arunachal Pradesh, as well as in Nepal. Smaller groups of practitioners can be found in Central Asia, some regions of China such as Northeast China, Xinjiang, Inner Mongolia and some regions of Russia, such as Tuva, Buryatia, and Kalmykia. Tibetan Buddhism evolved as a form of Mahayana, Mahāyāna Buddhism stemming from the latest stages of Indian Buddhism (which included many Vajrayana, Vajrayāna elements). It thus preserves many Indian Buddhist Tantra, tantric practices of the Gupta Empire, post-Gupta Medieval India, early medieval period (500–1200 CE), along with numerous native Tibetan developments. In the pre-modern era, Tibetan Buddhism spread outside of Tibet primarily due to the influence of the Mongol Emp ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Varnamala (other)
''Shiksha'' (, ) is a Sanskrit word, which means "instruction, lesson, learning, study of skill".Sir Monier Monier-Williams A DkSanskrit-English Dictionary: Etymologically and Philologically Arranged with Special Reference to Cognate Indo-European Languages, Oxford University Press (Reprinted: Motilal Banarsidass), , page 1070 It also refers to one of the six Vedangas, or limbs of Vedic studies, on phonetics and phonology in Sanskrit. ''Shiksha'' is the field of Vedic study of sound, focussing on the letters of the Sanskrit alphabet, accent, quantity, stress, melody and rules of euphonic combination of words during a Vedic recitation. Each ancient Vedic school developed this field of ''Vedanga'', and the oldest surviving phonetic textbooks are the '' Pratishakyas''. The ''Paniniya-Shiksha'' and ''Naradiya-Shiksha'' are examples of extant ancient manuscripts of this field of Vedic studies. ''Shiksha'' is the oldest and the first auxiliary discipline to the Vedas, maintained sin ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
