Yogachara
Also called: Vijnanavada · Topic: Buddhism, Jainism and Heterodox Traditions · NCERT: Beyond NCERT
Meaning
Yogachara was a school of Mahāyāna ("great vehicle") Buddhism, founded around the c. 4th century CE by the brothers Asanga and Vasubandhu. Its main idea was that only consciousness (the mind's awareness) is truly real. The outside world we see is, in this view, built up by the mind. That is why the school is also called Vijnanavada, the "doctrine of consciousness". Tradition links Asanga's teachings with Maitreya, the future Buddha. It matters because it became one of the two great schools of Mahāyāna thought and was widely taught in Indian monasteries.
Example
Vasubandhu's short work, the Twenty Verses, argues that the objects we seem to see are like things seen in a dream: they are made by the mind. Later, in the 7th century CE, the Chinese pilgrim Xuan Zang studied Yogachara at Nalanda and carried its texts back to China.
Don't confuse with
- Madhyamaka: the other major Mahāyāna school, founded by Nagarjuna. It taught shunyata (emptiness), the idea that nothing, not even the mind, has a fixed nature of its own. Yogachara holds that consciousness is real.
- Theravāda: the older tradition that keeps the Pali texts. It is not a Mahāyāna school at all.
Related concepts
- Mahayana
- Hinayana
- Bodhisattva
- Avalokiteshvara
- Maitreya
- Tara
- Vajrayana Buddhism
- Nagarjuna
- Madhyamaka
- Vasubandhu