Asaṅga · Xuánzàng · 大乘阿毘達磨集論

The Compendium of Abhidharma.

The Abhidharmasamuccaya — "Compendium of Abhidharma" — is Asaṅga's own systematic re-working of Abhidharma scholasticism through a Yogācāra lens: the five aggregates, elements, and sense fields analyzed in exhaustive detail, the four noble truths worked out at treatise-length, and the treatise's own closing chapters on the Dharma, on attainment, and on the rules of formal debate. This page is the entrance for reading it part by part, following the treatise's own two-part structure — 本事分, the foundations, and 決擇分, their detailed determination.

How to read this collection

This is the largest single treatise on this site — Asaṅga's own attempt to gather the entire field of Mahāyāna Abhidharma into one systematic work. We keep the treatise's own structure rather than smoothing it away: the foundations chapter (本事分) working through the aggregates, elements, and sense fields in full technical detail, followed by the determination chapter (決擇分), which takes up the four noble truths, the Dharma, attainment, and formal debate each in turn.

Our commentary guide is the Abhidharmasamuccayavyākhyā (大乘阿毘達磨雜集論), attributed to Sthiramati and completed by Jinaputra, translated into Chinese by the same Xuánzàng, so terminology stays aligned with the root text throughout.

What each part page includes

  • The Chinese source text beside our English translation.
  • Reading notes drawn from Sthiramati and Jinaputra's commentary.
  • A running glossary so terminology stays consistent across all 131 parts, and with the site's other Yogācāra pages.
131 of 131 parts — complete
7 fascicles in Xuánzàng's translation (T1605)

The Treatise's Own Structure

Asaṅga divides the whole work into two parts: 本事分, laying out the foundations, and 決擇分, determining them in far greater technical detail. The determination chapter is itself four further chapters long — 諦品 on the four noble truths, 法品 on the Dharma, 得品 on attainment, and 論議品 on formal debate.

本事分 · Foundations
The Five Aggregates, Elements, and Sense Fields
Form, feeling, perception, volition and the fifty-one mental factors, the ālayavijñāna, the eighteen elements and twelve sense fields, the hundred-gate analysis, wholesome/unwholesome/neutral dharmas, dependent origination, and the eight kinds of suffering.
Parts 1–31
決擇分 · 諦品
The Four Noble Truths
Suffering, origination, cessation, and the path, worked out at treatise length — the afflictions and karma in exhaustive detail, the many names of nirvāṇa, and the entire structure of the path from the path of seeing through the culminating path.
Parts 32–69
決擇分 · 法品
The Chapter on the Dharma
The twelve genres of scripture, the three baskets, the objects and principles of investigating the Dharma, and the vast teachings' own correct reading of emptiness against twenty-eight wrong views.
Parts 70–82
決擇分 · 得品
The Chapter on Attainment
The sevenfold classification of persons from ordinary being to bodhisattva, and the tenfold classification of direct realization with its full catalogue of eighteen categories of buddha-qualities.
Parts 83–122
決擇分 · 論議品
The Chapter on Formal Debate
The treatise's own closing methodology: seven kinds of determination through discourse, the full rules of formal debate down to its eight-part logical structure, and the treatise's own explanation of its own title.
Parts 123–131

Read by Part

All 131 parts, grouped by the treatise's own sections. Every part links to the full bilingual translation with reading notes.

五蘊 · The Five Aggregates and Their Analysis (本事分)

Part 1 Numbers and Defining Marks Part 2 Building the Aggregate of Form Part 3 Feeling and Perception Part 4 Volition, and the Universal, Particular, and Wholesome Factors Part 5 The Root Afflictions and the Five Views Part 6 Secondary Afflictions and the Indeterminates Part 7 Formations Dissociated from Mind Part 8 Consciousness, and the Proof of the Ālayavijñāna Part 9 The Eighteen Elements, Eight Unconditioned Dharmas, and Twelve Sense Fields Part 10 Mutual Inclusion, and the Meaning of Aggregate, Element, and Sense Field Part 11 The Hundred-Gate Analysis Begins Part 12 Form, Visibility, Resistance, and Contamination Part 13 Conflict, Defilement, and Indulgence Part 14 Conditioned and Unconditioned, Worldly and Supramundane Part 15 Already Arisen, Grasping, and the Two Gates Part 16 Defilement, and the Three Times Part 17 What Makes a Dharma Wholesome Part 18 Unwholesome and Morally Neutral Dharmas Part 19 The Three Realms, and Freedom from Desire Part 20 Trainee, Non-Trainee, and What Gets Abandoned How Part 21 Dependent Origination Part 22 The Four Conditions Part 23 Shared Experience, Appropriation, Faculties, and Three Kinds of Suffering Part 24 Karmic Ripening, the Four Nutriments, and 三法品's Close Part 25 Subsumption, Association, and Possession Part 26 The Sentient World and the Container World Part 27 The Eight Kinds of Suffering Part 28 Twelve Marks of Impermanence Part 29 Suffering, Emptiness, and Selflessness Part 30 Even Form Is Momentary Part 31 Death and the Intermediate State

諦品 · The Four Noble Truths

Part 32 The Truth of Origination Begins Part 33 The Nine Fetters Part 34 Bonds, Latent Tendencies, and Entanglements Part 35 Ties, Hindrances, and Stumps Part 36 Thirteen Further Names for the Same Three Poisons Part 37 Wrongful Conduct and Realm Part 38 The Two Classes, and How Abandonment Works Part 39 Karma Begins Part 40 Decisive Karma, and the Ten Karma-Paths' Three Fruits Part 41 Meritorious, Demeritorious, and Unshakable Karma Part 42 Shared Karma, and Strong Versus Weak Part 43 What 'Pleasant Karma Ripens as Pleasant' Really Means Part 44 Restraint, Non-Restraint, and Neither Part 45 Non-Restraint, and When Karma Actually Ripens Part 46 Black Karma, White Karma, and the Karma That Exhausts All Karma Part 47 What Makes an Act of Giving Complete Part 48 Nineteen Marks of Genuine Moral Discipline Part 49 The Truth of Origination Closes Part 50 The Truth of Cessation Begins Part 51 The Many Names of Nirvāṇa Part 52 The Truth of the Path Begins Part 53 The Path of Seeing Part 54 Four Aspects of the Path, and Two Scriptural Descriptions Part 55 The Path of Cultivation Begins Part 56 Seven Mental Applications, and the Naming of Immeasurable Absorptions Part 57 The Supramundane Path Part 58 Nine Grades of Path Against Nine Grades of Affliction Part 59 The Thirty-Seven Factors of Awakening Begin Part 60 Correct Exertions, and the Bases of Supernormal Power Part 61 The Five Faculties and Five Powers Part 62 The Seven Factors of Awakening Part 63 The Eightfold Noble Path Part 64 The Four Correct Practices, and the Four Footprints of the Dharma Part 65 Calm-Abiding and Insight, and the Four Types of Path Part 66 The Three Faculties Across the Path Part 67 The Culminating Path Part 68 Twenty-Four Kinds of Coarse Heaviness Part 69 Exhaustion-Knowledge, and the Truth of the Path Complete

法品 · The Chapter on the Dharma

得品 · The Chapter on Attainment

Part 83 Why Persons Are Provisionally Established Part 84 The Seven Temperaments, and the Three Vehicles Part 85 The Three Degrees of Provisions Part 86 Faith-Follower, Dharma-Follower, and the Five Kinds of Liberation Part 87 Stream-Entry, and the Three Fetters Part 88 Once-Returning, Non-Returning, and the Five Lower Fetters Part 89 Arhatship, and the Five Upper Fetters Part 90 Seven Returns, Family to Family, and One Interval Part 91 Five Ways the Non-Returner Attains Final Nirvāṇa Part 92 The Six Kinds of Arhat Part 93 Realm, and Persons Beyond the Ordinary Threefold Scheme Part 94 Five Stages of Bodhisattva Practice, and 建立補特伽羅 Complete Part 95 The Ten Kinds of Direct Realization Begin Part 96 Culminating Realization, and the Three Vehicles' Realization Part 97 Eleven Ways Bodhisattva Realization Differs Part 98 The Distinction of Fruit Begins Part 99 The Distinction of Fruit Complete Part 100 The Four Immeasurables Part 101 The Eight Liberations Part 102 Eight Stations of Mastery, and Ten Totalities Part 103 Non-Contention, and Wish-Knowledge Part 104 The Four Unhindered Understandings Part 105 The Six Superknowledges, and the Major and Minor Marks Part 106 The Four Purities Part 107 The Ten Powers Part 108 The Four Fearlessnesses Part 109 Three Foundations of Mindfulness, and Three States Requiring No Concealment Part 110 Never Forgetting, Permanent Elimination of Habitual Imprints, and Great Compassion Part 111 The Eighteen Exclusive Buddha-Qualities Begin Part 112 The Eighteen Exclusive Buddha-Qualities Complete Part 113 How These Qualities Are Generated Part 114 What Each Quality Accomplishes Begins Part 115 What Each Quality Accomplishes Complete Part 116 Inexhaustible Bodhisattvas, and Fourteen Undetermined Questions Part 117 Why Bodhisattvas Are Never Formally Named Stream-Enterers Part 118 Five Kinds of Bodhisattva Skill Begin Part 119 Ten Kinds of False Discrimination Part 120 Scattering Discrimination, and the Perfection of Wisdom's Own Teaching Part 121 Three Kinds of Non-Discrimination Part 122 Sharpening the Faculties, and 得品 Complete

論議品 · The Chapter on Formal Debate

Translation Notes

Recurring terms, kept consistent across all 131 parts, and matched to the site's other Yogācāra pages where the same term appears. See also this site's note on translation method.

本事分 / 決擇分 — foundations / determinationThe treatise's own two-part structure: laying out the basic categories, then determining them in far greater technical detail.
阿賴耶識 — ālayavijñānaThe storehouse consciousness, examined here alongside its full eight-proof case for existence, matched to the site's Mahāyānasaṃgraha and Cheng Weishi Lun pages.
五十一心所法 — the fifty-one mental factorsThe full Yogācāra taxonomy of mind's associated factors, kept terminologically identical to the site's Cheng Weishi Lun pages.
三自性 — the three naturesThe discriminated, dependent, and perfected natures — the same terms used across the site's other Yogācāra pages.
諦品 · 四聖諦 — the four noble truthsSuffering, origination, cessation, and the path, each given its own four-aspect closing summary in the treatise's own style.
建立補特伽羅 / 建立現觀 — persons and direct realization得品's own twofold structure: who attains, and what is attained.