Yogācārabhūmi-śāstra, also known as "Discourse on the Stages of Yogic Practice" is the encyclopaedic and definitive text of the Yogācāra school of Buddhism. It is thought to have been composed in India between 300 and 350 CE

The complete work comprises five major sections: the seventeen levels (bāhu-bhūmi) which covers the entire range of mental and spiritual levels in Buddhism according to Mahāyāna; the Compendium of Definitions (viniścaya-samgraha) which discusses and explicates aspects of the bāhu-bhūmi portion; the Compendium of Exegesis (vivarana-samgraha), a manual of hermeneutical and exegetical techniques; the Compendium of Synonyms (paryāya-samgraha) defining many of the various strings of quasi-synonymical expressions found in the Agamas; the Compendium of Topics (vastu-samgraha) summarizing and explainin the key topics of each sūtra contained in the Samyukta-āgama; and the Compendium of the Vinaya (vinaya-samgraha). The Chinese version also contains a Compendium of Abhidharma, missing from the Tibetan translation.

Most of the bāhu-bhūmi section which includes such seminal works as the Bodhisattva-bhūmi and the Śrāvaka-bhūmi suvives in Sanskrit, but little survives from the other parts. The Chinese version is made up of one hundred fascicles (juan),, and was translated into Chinese by Xuanzang between 646-648 at Hongfu and Dacien Monasteries. The Tibetan version was done by team of Indian scholars including Jinamitra, Prajñāvarma, Surendrabodhi, together with the renowned Tibetan translator, Ye-shes sDe. In East Asia, authorship is attributed to Maitreya-nātha, while the Tibetan tradition considers it to have been composed by Asanga, but in all probability it is the work of several writers who compiled it during the 4th century CE.

External links

• Digital Dictionary of Buddhism (log in with userID "guest")

• Summary of the Yogācārabhūmi-śāstra, Charles Muller and Dan Lusthaus