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Exposition of a Tengyur Scripture — Mahayana Treatise Piṭaka

Background

The Tengyur (བསྟན་འགྱུར་, “Translation of the Teachings”) is a collection of treatises and commentaries on Buddhist scriptures translated from Sanskrit into Tibetan, completed in the eleventh to twelfth centuries under the Tibetan kings. Unlike the Kangyur, the original scripture collection, the Tengyur consists of works by Indian Buddhist masters: engaging explanations, reasoned analyses, and methods of practice based on the principal scriptures.

In the Mahayana Northern Tibetan tradition, Tibetan Buddhism, the Tengyur is regarded as a priceless treasury of wisdom. The treatises in this collection include works by bodhisattvas such as Nāgārjuna, Asaṅga, Vasubandhu, and the wisest masters of the seventh to eleventh centuries that followed. These commentaries are not merely lines of scholarly annotation, but direct instructions for practice, helping practitioners deeply understand Buddhist doctrine, the Dharma, and apply it in practice.

Main Contents

Although no specific title has been provided for this scripture, it lies within the broad context of the Tengyur works, which focus on three main fields: Treatises on Wisdom (Prajñāpāramitā), Treatises on Consciousness (Vijñaptimātratā), and Treatises on Discipline (Vinaya and Śīla).

The treatises in the Tengyur often discuss the nature of mind, emptiness (śūnyatā), the stages of practice leading to awakening, and especially the bodhisattva path: the path of those who wish to become Buddhas in order to liberate all beings. They emphasize that Buddha-nature is not something remote, but the innate nature of mind, which only needs to be purified through practice.