Yogācāra

Yogachara (IAST: Yogācāra; literally "yoga practice"; "one whose practice is yoga") is an influential school of Buddhist philosophy and psychology emphasizing and ontology through the interior lens of meditative and yogic practices. It was associated with Indian Mahāyāna Buddhism in about the 4th century CE, but also included non-Mahayana practitioners of the Dārṣṭāntika school.

Yogācāra discourse explains how our human experience is constructed by the mind.

The Yogācāra, along with the Madhyamaka, is one of the two principal philosophical schools of Indian Mahāyāna Buddhism.

Masaaki (2005) states: "[a]ccording to the Saṃdhinirmocana Sūtra, the first Yogācāra text, the Buddha set the 'wheel of the doctrine' (Dharmacakra) in motion three times." The Saṃdhinirmocana Sūtra, as the doctrinal trailblazer of Yogācāra, inaugurated the paradigm of the Three Turnings of the Wheel of Dharma, with its own tenets in the "third turning". The Yogācāra texts are generally considered part of the third turning along with the relevant sutra. Moreover, Yogācāra discourse surveys and synthesizes all three turnings.

The orientation of the Yogācāra school is largely consistent with the thinking of the Pāli nikāyas. It frequently treats later developments in a way that realigns them with earlier versions of Buddhist doctrines. One of the agendas of the Yogācāra school was to reorient the complexity of later refinements in Buddhist philosophy to accord with early Buddhist doctrine.

Yogācāra, which had its genesis in the Saṃdhinirmocana Sūtra, was largely formulated by the brahmin-born half-brothers Asaṅga and Vasubandhu. Asaṅga spent many years in intense meditation, during which time tradition says that he often visited the Tuṣita Heaven to receive teachings from Maitreya. Heavens such as Tuṣita are said to be accessible through meditation and accounts of this are given in the writings of the Indian Buddhist monk Paramārtha, who lived during the 6th century CE.Xuanzang tells a similar account of these events:

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