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Glossary

This glossary contains an alphabetical list of Buddhist terms that you may find on this website. Many of the terms now include phoneticized Sanskrit (Skt) as well as two forms of Tibetan—the phonetic version (Tib), which is a guide to pronunciation, and transliteration using the Wylie method (Wyl). Search for the term you want by entering it in the search box or browse through the listing by clicking on the letters below. Please see our Content Disclaimer regarding English terms in LYWA publications that may be outdated and should be considered in context.

three modes of apprehending an object

Also known as the three I's when the referent object is the self; they are the three possible ways we can experience any object: seeing it as truly existent, seeing it as not truly existent and seeing it without qualifying it one way or the other.

three poisons

dug sum (Tib); dug gsum (Wyl)

Attachment, anger and ignorance.

three thousand great thousand universes

trisahasra (Skt); jigten tong sum (Tib); 'jig rten stong gsum (Wyl)

Aka trichiliocosm, so called because a thousand world systems makes a great world system and a thousand of those makes a second-order thousand-fold world system, and a thousand of those makes a third-order thousand-fold world system or three thousand great thousand universes.

three types of morality

tshultrim sum (Tib); tshul khrims gsum (Wyl)

Three aspects of the perfection of morality: the morality of restraining from wrong-doing, the morality of accumulating merit and the morality of benefiting sentient beings.