Sūtras and treatises of the Great Vehicle大乘經典
The Mahāyāna — the "Great Vehicle" — is the stream of Buddhism that spread north and east into China, Korea, Japan, Tibet, and Vietnam. Its scriptures turn on two ideas: the bodhisattva, who vows to awaken for the sake of all beings, and emptiness (śūnyatā), the seeing that sets that vow free. These are the texts recited in the great monasteries of East Asia, the source of Chan and Zen, Pure Land and Huayan.
Each scripture here is presented as a plain-English doorway: what it teaches, why it matters, and how to begin reading it. Some entries lead directly to a full reading guide; others are prepared as study paths so the collection can grow one text, one chapter, and one life-question at a time.
The scriptures of emptiness — the foundation of the whole Mahāyāna.
The middle way between existence and non-existence — Nāgārjuna's core insight, entered here through Candrakīrti's own guide.
The systematic account of the whole path, from the five senses to full liberation.
The formal rules of proof and refutation behind Yogācāra's own arguments — how to build a valid three-part argument, and every way one can go wrong.
The classical Mahāyāna vinaya: the ten major and forty-eight minor precepts a bodhisattva undertakes.
Zhiyi's own account of dhyāna as a graduated pāramitā — not a single technique, but a path walked step by step.
Ānanda's fall to a sorceress's spell, and the Buddha's long search for exactly where the mind is — read as a bare sūtra, or alongside Master Yuanying's classical commentary.
The vast "Flower Garland" scripture — the source of the Huayan school.
The scriptures that shaped the schools of East Asian Buddhism.
The path of faith — the recollection of Amitābha Buddha. All three of the "three Pure Land sūtras" (淨土三經) are complete, joined here by the fifth of the "five Pure Land sūtras" (淨土五經).
