Abhidharma-kosa

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Abhidharma-kośa (the compendium of Abhidharma) is a key text in verse written in Sanskrit by Vasubandhu. It summarizes Sarvāstivādin tenets in eight chapters with a total of around 600 verses. The text was widely respected, and used by schools of Mahayana Buddhism in India, Tibet and the Far East.

Vasubandhu wrote a commentary to his own work, called the Abhidharma-kośa-bhāsya. In it, he critiques the interpretations of the Sarvāstivādins and others of the tenets he presented in that work. This commentary includes an additional chapter in prose refuting the idea of the "person" (pudgala) favoured by some Buddhists. However, later Sarvāstivādin master Samghabhadra, considered that he misrepresented their school in the process, and at this point designated Vasubandhu as a Sautrantika (upholder of the sutras, rather than as an upholder of the Abhidharma.

The Abhidharma-kośa and its commentary is comprised of the following chapters:

1: The Dhātus

2: The Indriyas

3: The World

4: Karma

5: The Latent Defilements

6: The Path and the Saints

7: The Knowledges

8: The Absorptions

9: Refutation of the Pudgala

Ancient translations of the Abhidharma-kośa were made into Chinese by Paramārtha (564-567 CE) and by Xuán Zàng (651-654 CE). Other translations and commentaries exist in translations exist in Tibetan, Chinese and Mongolian, and modern translations have been made into English, French and Russian.