Mahāyāna

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Key Term	mahāyāna
Hover Popup Choices	great vehicle
In Tibetan Script	ཐེག་པ་ཆེན་པོ།
Wylie Tibetan Transliteration	theg pa chen po
Devanagari Sanskrit Script	महायान
Romanized Sanskrit	mahāyāna
Tibetan Phonetic Rendering	thekpa chenpo
Chinese Script	大乘
Chinese Pinyin	dasheng
Basic Meaning	The Buddhist system of ideas and practices which developed around the beginning of the common era highlighting altruism and illusory nature of phenomena.
Has the Sense of	A spiritual system which is greater and higher than the early schools of Buddhism, which are labelled as lesser vehicle.
Did you know?	The adherents of early Buddhist schools contended that Mahāyāna teachings are original teachings of the Buddha.
Related Topic Pages	https://www.bhutan.virginia.edu/subjects/8260/text-node/49751/nojs
Definitions

Mahāyāna, or the Great Vehicle, refers to the system of Buddhist thought and practice which developed around the beginning of Common Era, focusing on the pursuit of the state of full enlightenment of the Buddha through the realization of the wisdom of emptiness and the cultivation of compassion.