Flashcards: Buddhist philosophical concepts

Dharma ([dʱəɾmə]; Sanskrit: धर्म dharma, ; Pali: धम्म dhamma) is a key concept with multiple meanings in the Indian religions-Hinduism, Buddhism, Sikhism and Jainism.

Dzogchen (Wylie: rdzogs chen) or "Great Perfection", also called Atiyoga, is a tradition of teachings in Tibetan Buddhism aimed at attaining and maintaining the natural primordial state or natural condition.

Karuṇā (in both Sanskrit and Pali) is generally translated as compassion.

Mahāmudrā (Sanskrit, Tibetan: Chagchen, Wylie: phyag chen, contraction of Chagya Chenpo, Wylie: phyag rgya chen po) literally means "great seal" or "great symbol.

Ahimsa (Sanskrit: अहिंसा; IAST: ahimsā, Pāli: avihiṃsā) is a term meaning 'not to injure' and 'compassion'.

Theravada Buddhism defines arhat (Sanskrit) or arahant (Pali) as "one who is worthy" or as a "perfected person" having attained nirvana.

Bodhi (Sanskrit: बोधि; and Pali) in Buddhism is the understanding possessed by a Buddha regarding the true nature of things.

In Buddhism, buddhahood (Sanskrit: बुद्धत्व buddhatva, Pali: बुद्धत्त buddhatta or बुद्धभाव buddhabhāva) is the condition or rank of a buddha (/ˈbuːdə/ or /ˈbʊdə/, Sanskrit pronunciation: [ˈbud̪d̪ʱə] , Pali/Sanskrit for "awakened one").

Impermanence, also called Anicca or Anitya, is one of the essential doctrines and a part of three marks of existence in Buddhism.

Mahābhūta is Sanskrit and Pāli for "great element.

Nirvāṇa (/nɪərˈvɑːnə, -ˈvænə, nər-/; Sanskrit: निर्वाण nirvāṇa  [nirʋaːɳə]; Pali: निब्बान nibbāna ; Prakrit: णिव्वाण ṇivvāṇa ) literally means "blown out", as in a candle.

The Noble Eightfold Path (Pali: ariyo aṭṭhaṅgiko maggo, Sanskrit: āryāṣṭāṅgamārga) is an early summary of the path of Buddhist practices leading to liberation from samsara, the painful cycle of rebirth.

Saṃsāra is a Sanskrit word that means "wandering" or "world", with the connotation of cyclic, circuitous change.

Skandhas (Sanskrit) or khandhas (Pāḷi) means "heaps, aggregates, collections, groupings".

The Twelve Nidānas (Pali/Sanskrit: nidāna "cause, motivation, link") are twelve links doctrine of Buddhism where each link is asserted as a primary causal relationship between the connected links.

Vajrayāna (Sanskrit: वज्रयान, literally meaning either the Diamond Vehicle or Thunderbolt Vehicle) is the tantric corpus of Buddhism.

Śūnyatā (Sanskrit; Pali: suññatā), translated into English as emptiness and voidness, is a Buddhist concept which has multiple meanings depending on its doctrinal context.

Kleshas (Sanskrit: kleśa; Pali: kilesa; Standard Tibetan: nyon mongs,) in Buddhism, are mental states that cloud the mind and manifest in unwholesome actions.

Incarnation literally means embodied in flesh or taking on flesh.

Satya is the Sanskrit word for truth.

Merit (Sanskrit: puṇya, Pali: puñña, Chinese: 功德, Japanese: くどく, Thai: บุญ; Lao: ບຸນ; Burmese: ကောင်းမှု; Standard Tibetan: བསོད་ནམས་) is a widely recognized concept in Buddhism.

In Dzogchen teaching, rigpa (Tibetan: རིག་པ་, Wylie: rig pa; Skt. vidyā; "knowledge") is the knowledge of the ground.

In Buddhism, the term anattā (Pali) or anātman (Sanskrit) refers to the doctrine of "non-self", that there is no unchanging, permanent soul in living beings.

Buddha-nature or Buddha Principle refers to several related terms, most notably tathāgatagarbha and buddhadhātu.

The dharmakāya (Sanskrit: धर्मकाय; Pali: धम्मकाय, lit. "truth body" or "reality body") is one of the three bodies (trikaya) of the Buddha in Mahayana Buddhism.

The phrase unanswered questions or undeclared questions (Sanskrit avyākṛta, Pali: avyākata - "unfathomable, unexpounded"), in Buddhism, refers to a set of common philosophical questions that Buddha refused to answer, according to Buddhist texts.

The Trikāya doctrine (Sanskrit, literally "Three bodies"; 三身 Chinese: Sānshēn Vietnamese: Tam thân, Japanese: Sanjin or Sanshin, Tibetan: སྐུ་གསུམ, Wylie: sku gsum) is a Mahayana Buddhist teaching on both the nature of reality and the nature of Buddhahood.

Vipassanā (Pāli) or vipaśyanā (Sanskrit: विपश्यना; Myanmar: ဝိပဿနာ; Chinese: 觀 guān; Standard Tibetan: ལྷག་མཐོང་, lhaktong; Wyl. lhag mthong) in the Buddhist tradition means insight into the true nature of reality, namely as the Three marks of existence: impermanence, suffering or unsatisfactoriness, and the realisation of non-self.

Maya (IAST: māyā), literally "illusion" or "magic", has multiple meanings in Indian philosophies depending on the context.

Tantra (Sanskrit: तन्त्र) literally means "loom, weave" and generally refers to esoteric traditions of Hinduism and Buddhism that co-developed most likely about the middle of 1st millennium CE.

Brahmacharya (/ˌbrɑːməˈtʃɑːrjə/; Devanagari: ब्रह्मचर्य) literally means "going after Brahman (Supreme Reality, Self or God)".

Kenshō (見性) is a Japanese term from the Zen tradition.

In the Buddhist tradition, the five hindrances (Sanskrit: पञ्च निवारण pañca nivāraṇa; Pali: पञ्च नीवरणानि pañca nīvaraṇāni) are identified as mental factors that hinder progress in meditation and in our daily lives.

The Buddhist doctrine of the two truths (Wylie: bden pa gnyis) differentiates between two levels of satya (Sanskrit), meaning truth or "really existing" in the discourse of the Budhha: the "conventional" or "provisional" (saṁvṛti) truth, and the "ultimate" (paramārtha) truth.

Vicara (Sanskrit( विचार) and Pali, also vicāra; Tibetan phonetic: chöpa) is a Sanskrit term that is translated as "discernment", "sustained thinking", etc.

Nāmarūpa is a dvandva compound in Sanskrit and Pali meaning "name (nāma) and form (rūpa)".

Karma (Sanskrit, also karman, Pāli: kamma) is a Sanskrit term that literally means "action" or "doing".

Saṃsāra (Sanskrit, Pali; also samsara) in Buddhism is the beginning-less cycle of repeated birth, mundane existence and dying again.

Nirvana (Sanskrit, also nirvāṇa; Pali: nibbana, nibbāna ) is the earliest and most common term used to describe the goal of the Buddhist path.

Jambhala (also known as Dzambhala, Dzambala, Zambala or Jambala) is the God of Wealth and appropriately a member of the Jewel Family (see Ratnasambhava).

The brahmavihāras (sublime attitudes, lit. "abodes of brahma") are a series of four Buddhist virtues and the meditation practices made to cultivate them.

In Zen-Buddhism, Dharma transmission is a custom in which a person is established as a "successor in an unbroken lineage of teachers and disciples, a spiritual 'bloodline' (kechimyaku) theoretically traced back to the Buddha himself.

Buddhism has developed a complex psychology of personality types (Pali: Puggala-paññatti), personality traits and underlying tendencies (anusaya).

Vitarka (Sanskrit, also vitarkah; Pali: vitakka; Tibetan phonetic: tokpa) is a Buddhist term that is translated as "conception", "application of thought", etc.