Toh 2620Untitled

Exposition of Sutra Toh 2620—Tengyur

Background

Sutra Toh 2620 from the Tengyur (Northern Canon) is an important work in the Mahayana Buddhist tradition, found within the Abhidharma Piṭaka. The Tengyur is a collection of treatises, independent works, and commentaries by great Indian masters, translated into Tibetan during the seventh through ninth centuries. The purpose of the Tengyur is to clarify, explain, and develop the core teachings recorded in the Kangyur (the primary scriptural canon).

The inclusion of this sutra in the Abhidharma Piṭaka indicates that it is a work built upon the foundations of the early Buddha’s Dharma, but viewed through the lens of Mahayana thought. In the context of the Northern Canon, the Buddha’s Dharma is divided into three sections: Sutra, Vinaya, and Abhidharma; works in the Tengyur generally focus on the profound analysis of mental phenomena, the nature of phenomena (dharmatā), and the path to liberation.

Principal Content

Although the specific title has not yet been fully translated, judging from the work’s location within the Tengyur, it is an explanatory treatise belonging to the Yogācāra-Madhyamaka tradition, or it may concern concepts relating to the nature of mind (citta-svabhāva) and the truth of the emptiness of intrinsic nature (śūnyatā).

Commentaries in the Tengyur generally focus on analyzing phenomena (dharma) from many perspectives. They explain how the elements of mental activity function—the skandhas, dhatus, and ayatanas—the operation of causes and conditions (pratītyasamutpāda), and how beings are bound to the cycle of samsara by greed, hatred, and delusion (the three poisons). In particular, the Northern Canon tradition emphasizes the role of consciousness (viññāṇa) as the foundation of all experience, and the understanding that this consciousness can be transformed and purified through practice.

This sutra may concern the concepts of “right knowledge” (samyag-jñāna) or “Buddha-nature”—a classical Mahayana doctrine affirming that all sentient beings possess the latent capacity to become Buddhas.

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