In the Mahayana tradition the Buddha is viewed as a supramundane being. He multiplies himself and is often reflected in a pentad of buddhas—Vairochana, Akshobhya, Ratnasambhava, Amitabha, and Amoghasiddhi—who reveal various doctrines and elaborate liturgies and sometimes take the place of Shakyamuni.
As the tradition developed, there emerged new texts that were considered by Mahayana adherents to be Buddhavachana (“the word or words of the Buddha”). This new literature went far beyond the ancient canons and was believed to be the highest revelation, superseding earlier texts. In this literature the teaching is thought to operate on various levels, each adapted to the intellectual capacity and karmic propensities of those who hear it. The bodhisattva ideal
The purpose of the bodhisattva is to achieve enlightenment and to fulfill the vow to become a buddha. The bodhisattva also foregoes entrance into nirvana in order to remain in the world as long as there are creatures to be saved from suffering.
Avalokitesvara, the compassionate bodhisattva, shown as a compassionate figure with 11 heads and 8 arms, symbolic of his ability to sense humankind's needs everywhere in the universe. In the Rijksmuseum voor Volkenkunde, Leiden, Netherlands.Rijksmuseum voor Volkenkunde, Leiden, Netherlands
Beginning with the vow to become a buddha, the career of a bodhisattva, according to some texts, traverses 10 stages or spiritual levels (bhumi" class="md-crosslink">bhumi) and achieves purification through the practice of the 10 perfections (paramitas). These levels elevate the bodhisattva to Buddhahood. The first six levels are preliminary, representing the true practice of the six perfections (generosity, morality, patience, vigour, concentration, and wisdom). Even though further purification and fortification must be achieved in the following stages, irreversibility occurs as soon as the seventh stage has been reached and the bodhisattva has assumed the true buddha nature. This is the moment when he engages in activity aimed at fulfilling the obligations of a bodhisattva. The difference between this and the preceding six stages is that now the activity is explained as an innate and spontaneous impulse manifested with conscious constraint and therefore not subject to doubt. Everything is now uncreated, ungenerated; thus, the body of the bodhisattva becomes identified more and more completely with the essential body (dharmakaya), with Buddhahood, and with omniscience. The three Buddha bodies
The three bodies (trikaya" class="md-crosslink">trikaya; i.e., modes of being) of the Buddha are rooted in Hinayana teachings concerning the physical body, the mental body, and the body of the law. The theory of the three bodies was a subject of major discussion for the Mahayana, becoming part of the salvation process and assuming central significance in doctrine. The emanation body (nirmanakaya) is the form of the Buddha that appears in the world to teach people the path to liberation. The enjoyment (or bliss) body (sambhogakaya) is the celestial body of the Buddha to which contemplation can ascend. In the heavenly regions, or Pure Lands, the enjoyment body teaches the bodhisattva doctrines that are unintelligible to those who are unenlightened. The unmanifested body of the law (dharmakaya) already appears in the Saddharmapundarika, or Lotus Sutra, a transitional text of great importance to Mahayana devotional schools. In many Mahayana texts buddhas are infinite and share an identical nature—the dharmakaya.
As anticipated in ancient schools, the Buddha is the law (dharma) and is identified with an eternal dharma, enlightenment (bodhi), and nirvana. In later schools real existence is opposed to the mere appearance of existence, and voidness, the “thingness of things,” an undefinable condition, present and immutable within the Buddhas, is stressed. All is in the dharmakaya, the third body and expression of ultimate reality; nothing is outside it, just as nothing is outside space; transcendence and immanence come together. Other schools posit a presence that is innate within all human beings, even if it is not perceived. It is like a gem hidden in dross, which shines in its purity as soon as the veil of ignorance has been removed. New revelations
New revelations are made on earth and in heavenly paradises by Shakyamuni and other buddhas. The teaching is expounded uninterruptedly in the universe because worlds and paradises are infinite and all buddhas are consubstantial with the essential body. They speak to assemblies of shravakas (disciples), bodhisattvas, gods, and demons. The authors of the new doctrines revealed their religious enthusiasm in various highly expressive ways, filling their works with phantasmagoria of celestial choruses, fabulous visions in which shine flashes of new speculations, and trains of thought influenced by Indian speculative and mystical traditions. The texts, from which new trends spring, overflow with repetitions and modulate the same arguments with a variety of readings.
Mahayana thinkers faced the daunting challenge of producing a completely logical arrangement of this prolix literature, some of which had legendary origins. The Prajnaparamita" class="md-crosslink">Prajnaparamita (“Perfection of Wisdom”) and the Avatamsaka-sutras (“Flower Ornament Sutras”), for instance, are said to have been concealed by the nagas" class="md-crosslink">nagas, demigods that live in miraculous palaces in an underground kingdom. There are various Prajnaparamita texts, ranging from 100,000 verses (the Shatasahasrika) to only a few lines (the Prajnaparamitahrdaya-sutra, widely known as the Heart Sutra). The fundamental assumption of the Prajnaparamita is expounded in a famous verse: “like light, a mirage, a lamp, an illusion, a drop of water, a dream, a lightning flash; thus must all compounded things be considered.” Not only is there no “self,” but all things lack a real nature (svabhava) of their own. The Prajnaparamita-sutras announce that the world as it appears to us does not exist, that reality is the indefinable “thingness of things” (tathata; dharmanam dharmata), that voidness (shunyata) is an absolute “without signs or characteristics” (animitta). The Mahayana schools and their texts
The Mahayana tradition encompasses a great many different schools, including the Madhyamika; the Yogachara or Vijnanavada (Vijnaptamatrata); the Avatamsaka school, which recognized the special importance of the Avatamsaka-sutra; a number of different schools that recognized the special authority of the Saddharmapundarika (Lotus Sutra); various Pure Land devotional schools; and several Dhyana (“Meditation”) schools. Madhyamika (Sanlun/Sanron)
The Madhyamika (“Doctrine of the Middle Way”) system, also known as Shunyavada (“Theory of Negativity or Relativity”), held both subject and object to be unreal and systematized the doctrine of shunyata (“cosmic emptiness”) contained in the Prajnaparamita literature.