triyāna

From Buddha-Nature

< Key Terms

Glossarytriyāna

Sanskrit Noun

triyāna

three vehicles
त्रियान
ཐེག་པ་གསུམ་
三乗

Basic Meaning

Commonly seen in a Mahāyāna context, the three vehicles are the Śrāvakayāna, Pratyekabuddhayāna, and Bodhisattvayāna, which reference the three different types of Buddhist practitioners. However, these three vehicles can also reference the three types of Buddhist teachings of the Hīnayāna, Mahāyāna (or Pāramitāyāna), and the Vajrayāna.

On this topic
Book
An Introduction to Buddhism (Takasaki)
This book is based upon notes prepared by the author for general lectures on Buddhism which he has been giving to students at a number of universities in Tokyo since around 1960. The initial version of the present work first saw the light of day as part of a textbook for university students entitled Bukkyo ippan 仏教一般 (Buddhism in General) which was compiled in concert with professors specializing in Chinese and Japanese Buddhism and published by the Department of Buddhist Studies at Komazawa University in Tokyo. Then, at a later date, the author was approached by the Tokyo Daigaku Shuppankai (University of Tokyo Press) to write an introductory work on Buddhism for the edification of the general reading public. By permission of the Department of Buddhist Studies at Komazawa University, he accordingly extracted those sections of the above textbook which he had himself written ("Outline of Buddhism" and "Indian Buddhism"), to which he then made some additions and corrections and also appended a brief history of Buddhism covering not only India but also China and Japan. This was then published in 1983 under the title of Bukkyo nyümon 仏教入門 (An Introduction to Buddhism), of which the present work is an English translation. (Takasaki, preface to the English version, iii)
Takasaki, Jikidō. An Introduction to Buddhism. Translated by Rolf W. Giebel. Tokyo: Tōhō Gakkai, 1987. https://nirc.nanzan-u.ac.jp/en/files/2018/06/Takasaki-Jikido_An-Introduction-to-Buddhism.pdf
Book
Frameworks of Buddhist Philosophy
Jamgön Kongtrül's masterful survey of the broad themes and subtle philosophical points found in more than fifteen hundred years of Buddhist philosophical writings.
Callahan, Elizabeth M. (Kalu Rinpoché Translation Group), trans. Frameworks of Buddhist Philosophy: A Systematic Presentation of the Cause-Based Philosophical Vehicles. Book Six, Part Three of The Treasury of Knowledge. By Jamgön Kongtrul Lodrö Tayé ('jam mgon kong sprul blo gros mtha' yas). Ithaca, NY: Snow Lion Publications, 2007.
Video
Kazuo Kano at the 2019 Tathāgatagarbha Symposium
Kazuo Kano discusses the term tathāgatagarbha and its appearance in tantric scriptures and commentaries composed by Indic authors and shows how and for what purposes this term has been integrated into tantric contexts. In terms of precursors to the tantric usages, he notes mentions such as that found in the Mahāparinirvāṇasūtra, in which practitioners are taught to think of themselves as a stūpa—that is, a reliquary that contains a buddha within it and as such are objects of worship. As for Indian authors, he discusses the views of Ratnākaraśānti as representative of the Yogācāra school and the notion of the three vehicles (triyāna), and he discusses Abhayākaragupta as representative of the Madhyamaka school and the notion of a single vehicle (ekayāna). Some brief mention is also made of Kamalaśīla, who represents a synthesis of the two schools.
Kano, Kazuo. "Examples of the Term tathāgatagarbha Appearing in Indic Tantric Literature." Paper presented at the University of Vienna Symposium, Tathāgatagarbha Across Asia, Vienna, Austria, July 2019. Video, 42:13. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vIVDu1Ig7H8.
PhD Diss
Grosnick, W.: The Zen Master Dōgen’s Understanding of the Buddha-Nature in Light of the Historical Development of the Buddha-Nature Concept in India, China, and Japan
. . . The present study will have a twofold purpose: 1) to examine the history of the Buddha-nature concept in an attempt to discover a central core of meaning inherent in the concept, and 2) to evaluate Dōgen's view of the Buddha-nature in the light of that central core of meaning. Parts I and II of this work, which examine the doctrinal history of the Buddha-nature concept in India and China, are devoted to the former task, and Part III, which examines Dōgen's thought concerning the Buddha-nature, is devoted to the latter. It is hoped that through the examination of Dōgen's conception of the Buddha-nature in the light of the previous articulation of the concept, it will be possible to form conclusions concerning the significance of Dōgen's thought in Buddhist doctrinal history. (Grosnick, introduction, 7–8)
Grosnick, William. "The Zen Master Dōgen’s Understanding of the Buddha-Nature in Light of the Historical Development of the Buddha-Nature Concept in India, China, and Japan." PhD diss., University of Wisconsin-Madison, 1979.
PhD Diss
Lee, S.: Toward a New Paradigm of East Asian Yogācāra Buddhism: Taehyŏn (ca. 8th Century CE), a Korean Yogācāra Monk, and His Predecessors
Abstract

This dissertation seeks to locate the place of Taehyŏn 大賢(ca. 8th century CE), a Silla Korean Yogācāra monk, within the broader East Asian Buddhist tradition. My task is not confined solely to a narrow study of Taehyŏn’s thought and career, but is principally concerned with understanding the wider contours of the East Asian Yogācāra tradition itself and how these contours are reflected in Taehyŏn’s extant oeuvre. There are problems in determining Taehyŏn's doctrinal position within the traditional paradigms of East Asian Yogācāra tradition, that is, the bifurcations of Tathāgatagarbha and Yogācāra; Old and New Yogācāra; the One Vehicle and Three Vehicles; and the Dharma Nature and Dharma Characteristics schools. Taehyŏn's extant works contain doctrines drawn from across these various divides, and his doctrinal positions therefore do not precisely fit any of these traditional paradigms. In order to address this issue, this dissertation examines how these bifurcations originated and evolved over time, across the geographical expanse of the East Asian Yogācāra tradition. The chapters of the dissertation discuss in largely chronological order the theoretical problems involved in these bifurcations within Yogācāra and proposes possible resolutions to these problems, by focusing on the works of such major Buddhist exegetes as Paramārtha (499-569), Ji 基 (632-682), Wŏnhyo 元曉 (617-686), Fazang 法藏(643-712), and, finally, Taehyŏn.
Lee, Sumi. "Toward a New Paradigm of East Asian Yogācāra Buddhism: Taehyŏn (ca. 8th Century CE), a Korean Yogācāra Monk, and His Predecessors." PhD diss., University of California, Los Angeles, 2014. https://escholarship.org/uc/item/74h5d0nv#main.
Term Variations
Key Term triyāna
Topic Variation triyāna
Tibetan ཐེག་པ་གསུམ་
Wylie Tibetan Transliteration theg pa gsum
Devanagari Sanskrit त्रियान
Chinese 三乗
Chinese Pinyin sānchéng
Japanese Transliteration sanjō
Korean Transliteration samsŭng
Buddha-nature Site Standard English three vehicles
Richard Barron's English Term three spiritual approaches
Jeffrey Hopkin's English Term three vehicles
Gyurme Dorje's English Term three vehicles
Alternate Spellings yānatraya
Term Information
Source Language Sanskrit
Basic Meaning Commonly seen in a Mahāyāna context, the three vehicles are the Śrāvakayāna, Pratyekabuddhayāna, and Bodhisattvayāna, which reference the three different types of Buddhist practitioners. However, these three vehicles can also reference the three types of Buddhist teachings of the Hīnayāna, Mahāyāna (or Pāramitāyāna), and the Vajrayāna.
Did you know? The ultimate goal of the Śrāvakayāna is the state of an arhat, while the ultimate goal of the Bodhisattvayāna is buddhahood.
Related Terms Ekayāna
Term Type Noun
Definitions
Princeton Dictionary of Buddhism See page 926: In Sanskrit, “three vehicles,” three different means taught in Buddhist soteriological literature of conveying sentient beings to liberation.
Tshig mdzod Chen mo nyan thos kyi theg pa/ rang rgyal gyi theg pa/ byang sems kyi theg pa ste gsum/



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