Yogacarabhumi-sastra


The Yogācārabhūmi-Śāstra is a very influential, large encyclopedic compendium, associated with north Indian Sanskritic Mahāyāna Buddhism. It is generally associated with the Indian Yogācāra school because it contains certain unique Yogācāra doctrines, like the eight consciousnesses and the ālaya-vijñāna. According to Ulrich Timme Kragh, "its overall objective seems to be to present a coherent structure of Buddhist yoga practice with the Mahāyāna path of the bodhisattva placed at the pinnacle of the system", but substantial parts also deal with non-Mahāyāna "mainstream" practices. The text also shows strong affinity to the Abhidharma works of the Mainstream Buddhist Sarvāstivāda school, adopting many of its technical terminology and classifications of phenomena.
While it likely contains earlier materials, the YBh is thought to have reached its final redaction in the fourth century CE. Traditional sources name either the Indian thinker Asaṅga or the bodhisattva Maitreya as author, but most modern scholars hold that it is a composite text with different chronological textual layers and various authors, though this does not rule out the possibility that Asaṅga was among them.
The YBh was studied and transmitted in East Asian Buddhist and Tibetan Buddhist translations. It remained influential in these traditions, however, because of massive size and complexity, it was eventually abandoned in monastic seminaries. Besides the Chinese and Tibetan translations which survive in full, at least 50% of the text survives in nine extant Sanskrit fragments.

Content overview

The complete YBh comprises five major sections, which can be divided into the Basic Section and the Supplementary Section.

Basic Section

The first section, which is the largest, is the "main stages division" or "the basic section" and contains fourteen books that describe the successive seventeen levels, which cover the entire range of mental and spiritual stages of practice in Mahayana Buddhism. However, according to Ulrich Timme Kragh, "in the present context, the word bhūmi appears in many cases to imply a 'foundation' in the sense of a field of knowledge that the Yogācāra acolyte ought to master in order to be successful in his or her yoga practice." Most of the Basic Section which includes such seminal works as the Bodhisattva-bhūmi and the Śrāvaka-bhūmi survives in Sanskrit, but little survives from the other parts. The following list is based on the Chinese arrangement, which seems to be closer to the original order.
The fourteen books of this section are:
  1. Pañcavijñānakāyasamprayuktā Bhūmiḥ - The Foundation on the Fivefold Group of Empirical Consciousness. It provides an analysis of the five sensory consciousnesses, in terms of five points, their bases, nature, foci, accompanying mental states and functioning.
  2. Manobhūmi - The Foundation on Cognition. Self consciousness is explained in detail, in terms of the same five points outlined above. It also explains the ālayavijñāna and afflictive cognition or kliṣṭaṃ manaḥ, as well as the 51 mental factors . In explaining karman, an extensive overview of death and rebirth is given, as well as an exposition of Buddhist cosmology and 24 typologies which discuss many modes of existence. The rest of the book discusses various classifications of dharmas, including physical, mental and unconditioned phenomena, as well as their casual relations and their ethical classification as beneficial or not or indeterminate.
  3. Savitarkasavicārādibhūmi - The Foundation on Having Discernment and Discursiveness, and So Forth. - Vitarka and Vicara are explained at great length, as well as correct observation and incorrect observation. The three realms are also explained. The defilements are also explained in this section.
  4. Samāhitā Bhūmiḥ - The Foundation on Meditative Absorption. Topics dealing with meditation are discussed in this book, such as dhyāna, different types of liberation, meditative attainments such as nirodhasamāpatti, the five hindrances, the various types of foci or 'images' on which the meditator concentrates, and the four powers. Different kinds of samādhi are outlined, such as the emptiness, wishlessness, and imagelessness, as well as samādhi with and without vitarka-vicara.
  5. Asamāhitā Bhūmiḥ - The Foundation on Being Without Meditative Absorption. This short book lists 12 states that remain devoid of Meditative Absorption, such as a mind that is engaged in the realm of sensual desire.
  6. Sacittikā Acittikā Bhūmiḥ - The Foundation on Having Mentation and Being Without Mentation. This short book "examines the notion of 'mind' or 'mentation' in relation to meditation and other doctrines" and discusses different states that are with or without citta, such as nirvāṇa, which is a state in which all mentation ceases, even the latent consciousness.
  7. Śrutamayī Bhūmiḥ - The Foundation on What is Derived from Listening. Focuses on various issues dealing with learning, listening to, and memorizing Buddhist doctrine, such as its subdivisions into Sutra, Vinaya and Matrka. It outlines various basic Buddhist concepts in different sets or groupings. It also outlines other forms of knowledge, such as the arts of healing, logical reasoning, and linguistic knowledge.
  8. Cintāmayī Bhūmiḥ - The Foundation on What is Derived from Understanding. Understanding is when the practitioner, based on his studies, arrives at a certain view of reality and of the path that leads to full understanding of reality. This book then focuses on different classifications of the characteristics of existence, such as specific characteristics, general characteristics, and causal characteristics. It also presents an analysis of "fivefold existence", the first three of which are the Yogacara "three natures".
  9. Bhāvanāmayī Bhūmiḥ - The Foundation on What is Derived from Meditative Cultivation. Discusses cultivation, in terms of its basis, conditions, practice of yoga and its results. The right circumstances needed to encounter the teachings and practice them are explained, as well as the conditions for the development of insight and tranquility. The ten types of remedies and antidotes applied to the afflictions are outlined, including contemplating unattractiveness, impermanence, suffering, indifference to food and contemplating death. Practical advice is also given on topics such as living with others, finding and learning from a teacher, material affairs, one's environment, sleep and eating patterns, practicing asceticism, etc.
  10. Śrāvakabhūmi - The Foundation on the Hearer. This book focuses on practices associated with "hearers" or "disciples". Lambert Schmithausen, Noritoshi Aramaki, Florin Deleanu and Alex Wayman all hold that this is the oldest layer of the YBh. It is divided into four sections called yogasthānas. The first section discusses, in depth, how different practitioners have different spiritual dispositions, how one enters into the path and goes forth into the life of renunciation. The path is divided into two branches, the mundane and supramundane which are explained, along with the 13 requisites needed for following them, including ethics, restraint of the senses, proper food intake, a spiritual friend and so on. The second section discusses numerous different personality types and also various forms of meditation are described in detail. Certain meditations are then recommended for certain personality types. The thirty-seven factors of Awakening and the four stages of fruition are also explained in detail. The third section discusses various practical issues such as the teacher student relationship, solitary retreat, various meditation topics such as one-pointedness of mind, śamatha and vipaśyanā, and the purification of hindrances. The fourth section discusses the mundane and supramundane paths in detail. The mundane path deals with abandoning the sensual realm and practicing the meditative absorptions, which lead to rebirth in high realms. The supramundane path deals with fully understanding the four noble truths and its sixteen characteristics, which lead to nirvana as an arhat.
  11. Pratyekabuddhabhūmi - The Foundation on the Solitary Buddha. Outlines the path and practices of the pratyekabuddha.
  12. Bodhisattvabhūmi - The Foundation on the Bodhisattva. Divided into three yogasthānas. Yogasthāna I deals with the basis for becoming a bodhisattva. It also discusses how bodhisattvas are superior to other practitioners. Yogasthāna II explains the characteristics of bodhisattvas , classes of bodhisattvas, exalted conviction and dwellings in the practice of a bodhisattva. Yogasthāna III explains the five kinds of rebirths a bodhisattva undergoes during their journey, the six ways that they lead sentient beings to perfection, seven bodhisattva levels, the bodhisattva's practices and their ascension to Buddhahood along with all the Buddha qualities which are manifested in them.
  13. Sopadhikā Bhūmiḥ - The Foundation on Having an Existential Substratum. This discusses the state of the living arhat, as well as "what it is that forms the remaining layer or basis for continued saṃsāric existence, namely the notion of there being an existential substratum ", such as the five aggregates and so forth.
  14. Nirupadhikā Bhūmiḥ - The Foundation on Being Without an Existential Substratum. This final book explains the state of an arhat who has died and entered parinirvāṇa,'' and thus is without a substratum for continued existence. This state is said to be complete and eternal extinction/completion.

    Supplementary Section

This part is made up of four 'collections' or 'compendia', which supplement the Basic Section:
The Chinese version also contains a Compendium of Abhidharma, missing from the Tibetan translation.
An Indian commentary was also written on the YBh, called the Yogācārabhūmivyākhyā.

Chinese translation

By the end of the Sui dynasty, Buddhism within China had developed many distinct schools and traditions. In the words of Dan Lusthaus:
The leader of Nalanda, Śīlabhadra taught this shastra to Xuanzang and other audiences three times in nine or fifteen months. The Xuanzang version consists of one hundred fascicles, and was translated into Chinese between 646-648 CE at Hongfu Monastery and Dacien Monastery.
Before Xuanzang's version, Dharmakṣema, Guṇabhadra and Paramartha had translated part of it.

Tibetan translation

The Tibetan version was done by team of Indian scholars including Jinamitra, Prajñāvarma and Surendrabodhi together with the renowned Tibetan translator, Yéshé Dé lotsawa. In East Asia, authorship is attributed to Maitreya-nātha, while the Tibetan tradition considers it to have been composed by Asanga, but in all probability it is the work of several writers who compiled it during the 4th century CE.
Nan Huai-Chin touches on the Yogacarabhumi-sastra in his book.

English translation

A subsection of the work, the Bodhisattva-bhūmi, was translated into English by Artemus Engle and is part of the Tsadra series published by Shambhala Publications.