Foundation • Module 5
Estimated time to complete: 60 minutes
Buddhism’s Spread & The Three Vehicles
Historical Context for Understanding the Curriculum
Why Buddhist History Matters for Meditation Theory
Buddhism does not have one single text like a bible that contains all the Buddha’s teachings. In fact, there are literally thousands of textual volumes claiming to be authentic teachings of the Buddha. This diversity emerged because the Buddha himself gave many different teachings tailored to provide each student a way to awaken. He also reportedly empowered his monks to translate and adapt Buddhist ideas and methods to different cultural and linguistic contexts. They were to be flexible rather than dogmatic in teaching others, and to give creative teachings to meet different students’ needs.
Given the mass of Buddhist scriptures, some traditional Buddhist scholars have proclaimed that the Buddha gave 84,000 different teachings—a traditional way of expressing vastness—which were like medicinal methods to address 84,000 different types of dis-ease. Other Western scholars describe many different “Buddhisms” evolving over the last 2,500 years, like water making its way down a craggy rock mountain, forming itself according to the landscape, breaking into new streams that sometimes merged with others.
However you choose to interpret the diversity of Buddhist views and practices available today, most students simply don’t have time to navigate the complicated terrain of divergent histories and contradictory claims—about whether the Buddha really taught this or that principle or practice—and still focus on the comparative Buddhist meditation theory and practice presented in this Palace of Learning.
So we’ll present here a brief narrative outline of the history and development of three modern forms of Buddhism, the three “turnings” of Buddhism, and the “three vehicles,” and how they correlate to Tarpa’s curriculum so that students don’t get confused. This isn’t about names, dates, and places in some ancient, irrelevant religious history. It’s about providing only the necessary historical context for learning Buddhist meditation theory and helping us understand why we’ll encounter fundamentally different approaches to meditation as we progress—each offering valuable tools to serious practitioners investigating their experience toward that existential happiness the Buddha reportedly discovered.
Since the Buddhist meditation theory presented in this curriculum is influenced by a Tibetan Buddhist perspective, we need to address several key questions:
What are the three main forms of Buddhism today?
How do these correlate to the “three turnings” of Dharma?
How do these relate to the three fundamentally different sets of meditation practice frameworks—Small Vehicle, Great Vehicle, and Diamond Vehicle—each with its own particular approach and methods for investigating experience?
How does the Tibetan perspective on the three vehicles inform the structure of the Palace of Learning?
Before explaining how the three forms of Buddhism today relate to each other—namely Southeast Asian, East Asian, and Northern Asian—we must first consider how Buddhism spread then split after the Buddha died, evolved into “three turnings,” and coalesced into “three vehicles.” This spread and split wasn’t primarily a problem of geographic expansion but rather a confluence of different interpretive styles and cultural influences—like water flowing down rocky crags, forming new streams as it encountered different terrain. Different cultural contexts raised different questions about how to practice, how to interpret teachings, how to explain meditation’s purpose. Some of these questions related to translating Buddhist concepts into different languages, where words available in one culture didn’t exist in another.
We’ll then examine how the Buddhist community split into two main factions due to a fundamental disagreement about whether it was best to preserve the Buddha’s teachings through a “closed” or an “open” canon. This canonical split set the stage for everything that followed.
After the Buddha Died
The First Sangha Council
After the Buddha died around 400 BCE, an urgent question emerged: how does one preserve what he taught? But even more pressing for practitioners: how does one preserve the meditation methods without a living teacher to correct practice?
During the Buddha’s lifetime, he gave daily teachings on a variety of topics, including practice. Over forty years, many people throughout India became Buddhists and developed a method for passing teachings on orally through structured, systematic memorization of complete texts.
When Buddhism emerged, writing existed but was considered less authoritative than memorization for preserving the Buddha’s words. The scale of Buddhist scripture was vast. The community organized this systematically: every teaching the Buddha gave over forty years was assigned to someone responsible for memorizing and preserving it—including detailed meditation instructions.
After the Buddha’s death, senior monks convened an assembly. Together they recited the teachings they knew, developing standardized systems for oral preservation. The First Sangha Council brought together 500 accomplished monks who spent months reciting scriptures together, ensuring communal agreement on accurate transmission.
Significantly, the council decided to preserve only the major rules while allowing flexibility on minor ones. The reasoning: minor details could adapt to different communities’ needs. This decision about what counted as fixed versus flexible would have lasting implications as Buddhism spread to new cultural contexts—and as different communities emphasized different meditation practices suited to their circumstances.
Buddhism Spreads Across Asia
Confluence of Interpretive Styles
After the Buddha’s death, Buddhism began spreading beyond northern India. This spread wasn’t simply geographic expansion but a complex confluence of interpretive styles encountering vastly different cultural landscapes. Between Greece and Southeast Asia lay an enormous region where Buddhism would flow like water down rocky crags—forming, reforming, and branching as it encountered different cultural contexts.
Around 334 BCE—within a century of the Buddha’s death—Alexander the Great conquered territories reaching into northern India. His forces made contact with Buddhist practitioners, and he traveled with philosophers including Pyrrho, who would later found the Greek Skeptical school. Some scholars suggest Buddhist philosophical methods may have influenced early Greek philosophy, though the evidence remains unclear.
Within a few centuries, King Ashoka (270-232 BCE) became Buddhism’s first major imperial patron. After reportedly encountering a Buddhist monk and questioning his own violent conquests, Ashoka converted and dedicated his empire’s resources to spreading Buddhist teachings throughout his domains.
But this geographic spread brought Buddhism into contact with radically different cultural frameworks. Southeast Asian kingdoms emphasized monastic withdrawal. Central Asian trade routes created lay practitioner communities. East Asian cultures already had sophisticated philosophical traditions like Daoism and Confucianism. Each context raised different questions: How do we practice meditation here? How do we interpret the Buddha’s teachings? How do we explain contemplative methods’ purpose?
Some questions related to translation itself. When translating Buddhist concepts into different languages, words available in one culture often didn’t exist in another. How do you translate “dharma” into Chinese when no equivalent term exists? How do you explain “karma” in Greek philosophical terms? Different linguistic and conceptual frameworks demanded different approaches.
Like water encountering rocky terrain, Buddhist interpretation began branching—not because the Buddha’s teaching was unclear, but because different cultural contexts demanded different approaches. This confluence of interpretive styles—Indian Buddhist methods meeting Greek philosophy, Persian thought, Chinese Daoism, countless local traditions—would eventually lead to fundamental questions about authority and innovation in meditation teaching.
The Great Schism: Two Canons, Two Approaches
By around 300 years after the Buddha’s death (circa 100 BCE), the Buddhist community split decisively between Southeast and Northwest regions, each of which had their own cultural influences. This schism wasn’t primarily about meditation technique—both regions still practiced similar basic methods. It concerned something more fundamental: authority.
The Buddhist communities in South India (and later Southeast Asia) preferred a “closed canon” which held that the Buddha’s actual words alone should be preserved as authoritative Dharma scriptures, not the words of other teachers.
The Buddhist communities in Northwest India (and later East and North Asia) preferred an “open canon” which held that if anyone with some degree of awakening speaks truth, their words too should be preserved as as authoritative Dharma scriptures equal to the Buddha’s.
The Open Canon: “Every Articulation of the Truth is a Teaching of a Buddha”
The Northwest’s open canon rested on a famous statement attributed to the Buddha: subhāṣitam sarvaṃ buddhasya vacanam—which can be interpreted to mean anything from “All that is well-expressed is the word of the buddha” to “Anything well-advised is the advice of the buddha” to “Every articulation of the truth is a teaching of a buddha.”
However you understand its original intent, this statement gave room for scriptures revealed later to be called teachings of the Buddha, including texts that discussed meditation methods more extensively and tantric texts that introduced entirely new contemplative approaches. In the scriptures of the open canon, many interlocutors took a more central role in giving teachings. But the Buddha would often be present or appear at a key moment to confirm, clarify, or expand upon what someone else taught. In the course of time, several certain scriptures also stated that they reveal deeper truth that the Buddha didn’t teach publicly but transmitted to advanced disciples during his lifetime.
From the Southeast perspective, this was corruption—a feeble attempt to add material the Buddha never taught and calling it authentic. From the Northwest perspective, they were just following the Buddha himself, who said that his own teachings were provisional (remember the Raft Analogy) and that his disciples should present the Dharma teachings in the vernacular of different cultural-linguistic contexts.
Two Canons, Two Awakenings
The open canon included all the scriptures from the closed canon. They also came to have a large number of additional scriptures that were grounded in the things Buddha taught in the closed canon but that expanded upon them in ways that shifted the emphasis or went a step further. One main difference between these additional scriptures and those in the closed canon is their interpretation of Buddha’s statement that all beings could attain “awakening” equal to himself. The “closed canon” communities interpreted Buddha to mean the awakening of an Arhat—someone who achieves the same personal freedom from suffering that the Buddha attained. The “open canon” communities interpreted Buddha to mean we could also attain the awakening of a buddha—someone who attains not only the same personal freedom as the Buddha but also his full capacity to reveal teachings appropriate for sentient beings. These two different goals of awakening set the stage for Buddhism’s further diversification. As the open canon evolved, two other sets of revealed scriptures were included in the canon—each of which purported to contain a more authoritative articulation of the ultimate truth. Among these three scriptural orientations—which became known as the “three turnings of the wheel of Dharma”—the first taught the meditation theory for becoming an Arhat while the second and third taught the meditation theory for becoming a buddha. (Note capital “B” Buddha refers to the historical Buddha, whereas small “b” buddha refers to anyone with the same attainment)
The Three Turnings of the Wheel of Dharma
Addressing Our Second Question: The Correlation to Turnings
Previously, we asked how the three forms of Buddhism today correlate to the “three turnings of the dharma wheel”?
Before addressing this question, we should clarify what the metaphoric phrase “turning of the wheel of Dharma” means to invoke. In brief, the idea is that when a buddha teaches the Dharma, those teachings continue on in this world well after his death, like a wheel continuing to roll downhill well after it had been pushed in that direction. The open canon scriptures—with their three different viewpoints on ultimate truth—came to be known as stemming from three different Dharma wheels. According to the open canon community, the Buddha caused these wheels to turn—he set them in motion with particular teachings he gave—and they would continue to roll well after his death. Although the open communities claimed the scriptures of the “three turnings” to be Buddha’s own teachings to different audiences in different phases of his life, many Western scholars generally consider these three turnings to be three phases of scriptural revelations by later Buddhists. Certainly, many scriptural texts were revealed later after the Buddha died, as certain scriptures, such as the Pratyutpanna-samādhi scripture and others, sometimes state. But since these scriptures offered interpretations of teachings mutually accepted with the closed canon scriptures, it is possible that the different interpretations represented in the “three turnings” could trace back to an early, pre-institutional period of Buddhist interpretation. Whatever the case, keep in mind that different Buddhists interpret the validity and authority of these “turnings” differently, with each positioning its own viewpoint as most definitive and the others as provisional at best.
Later in the curriculum, we’ll explore in much more detail the Tibetan presentation of the Three Turnings as progressive philosophical refinements. For now, we are simply highlighting the way that they historically gave rise to three different Buddhist “vehicles”, each with its own meditation theory which informs the structure of the curriculum in the Palace of Learning.
The Three Vehicles
Our Third Question: From Turnings to Vehicles
Previously, we asked a third question: how do the three turnings relate to the three vehicles, each with their own meditation theories and practices?
Before addressing this question, we should clarify what “vehicle” means to evoke here? The Sanskrit term yāna (=vehicle) refers to either a means of transportation—something that carries you from one place to another—or to the journey itself. In this Buddhist context, it is often translated as a “vehicle” but refers to a cohesive set of theories and practices that work together to provide a means for traveling the path to awakening. Think of each vehicle not as a single technique but as an entire system. It includes theories about how meditation functions combined with specific methods of practice, all working together in a unified approach toward the goal of awakening.
There were three vehicles that emerged from the three turnings we just discussed. The Small Vehicle—which evolved from the scriptures of the first turning of the dharma wheel—aims for one’s own awakening as an Arhat. The Great Vehicle and the Diamond Vehicle—which evolved from scriptures of the second and third turnings of the dharma wheel—aim for one’s own awakening as a buddha. As each of the scriptural teachings were practiced and commented upon over time, practitioners worked out more refined theories about how meditation functions and systematized different cohesive approaches to meditation practice on the path to their respective awakenings.
We will discuss these vehicles and their differences at length subsequently in the Palace of Learning. For now, it may help to think of them like this:
The Small Vehicle is like a bicycle, sufficient for one person’s journey to the awakening as an Arhat.
The Great Vehicle is like a large school bus, absolutely necessary for awakening as a buddha who brings all beings along for the journey.
The Diamond Vehicle is like a jumbo jet, efficient technology for awakening quickly as a buddha and bringing all beings along for the journey.
According to the Tibetan interpreters of the Diamond Vehicle, these three vehicles should be seen as cumulative frameworks necessary to address different levels of questions that naturally arise through serious practice.
According to Small Vehicle interpreters, this idea of a “beginner,” “intermediate,” and “advanced” level was made up by people who could not manage to awaken by the path taught by the Buddha.
At Tarpa, we will explain the Tibetan view of the meditation theory in all three vehicles according to a secular perspective. In doing so, we are explaining the theory and practice of Buddhist meditation comparatively, not intending to treat the Small Vehicle as inferior or the Great and Diamond Vehicle as superior—even though this sort of comparative rhetoric is sewn into the fabric of the vehicles themselves.
The Three Forms of Buddhism Today
Our First Question Answered: The Three Main Forms
We can now directly answer our first question: what are the three main forms of Buddhism today, and how did they evolve from the three vehicles?
As Buddhism spread across Asia and encountered different cultural contexts over centuries, the three vehicles—three distinct cohesive approaches to meditation theory and practice—developed into three recognizable forms of Buddhism that exist today. Each form evolved as the vehicles adapted to and were preserved in different regions.
Southeast Asian Theravāda Buddhism: Small Vehicle Emphasis
Theravāda Buddhism (“Teaching of the Elders”) evolved from the Small Vehicle approach, preserved primarily in Southeast Asia—Burma, Thailand, Sri Lanka, Cambodia, Laos. This tradition maintains the closed canon and emphasizes individual liberation through systematic investigation. Meditation practice focuses on intensive retreat, often in monastic settings, following methodological guidelines preserved for over 2,000 years.
East Asian Mahāyāna Buddhism: Great Vehicle Emphasis
Mahāyāna Buddhism (“Great Vehicle”) evolved from the Great Vehicle approach, spreading through East Asia—China, Korea, Japan—and historically through Central Asia. This tradition maintains the open canon and emphasizes investigating for the benefit of all beings. Meditation practice developed distinctive schools like Chan/Zen and Pure Land that work with emptiness and compassion together.
North Asian Vajrayāna Buddhism: Diamond Vehicle Emphasis
Vajrayāna Buddhism (“Diamond Vehicle”) evolved from the Diamond Vehicle approach, preserved primarily in Tibet, Mongolia, Nepal, Bhutan, and the Himalayan regions. This tradition incorporates both earlier vehicles and adds advanced methods found in texts called Tantras. Meditation practice involves systematic training through all three vehicles progressively—beginning with Small Vehicle concentration, moving through Great Vehicle analysis, then receiving tantric empowerments for Diamond Vehicle practices.
These three forms of Buddhism today represent how the three vehicles adapted to and were preserved in vastly different cultural contexts after Buddhism largely disappeared from India. Each developed distinctive institutions, interpretive frameworks, teaching methods, and language-specific terminology—all suited to their respective audiences. But all three trace their genealogy back to the Buddha’s original teachings.
Tibet’s Unique Role
Our Final Question: The Tibetan Perspective and Palace Structure
This brings us to our final question: how does the Tibetan perspective on the three vehicles inform the structure of the Palace of Learning?
Preserving Complete Meditation Curriculum
Tibet’s significance for our study of meditation theory and practice extends beyond its texts or general approach to the Diamond Vehicle. Tibetan communities developed detailed training systems that teach all three vehicles’ methods progressively. A practitioner might spend years developing concentration through Small Vehicle and Great Vehicle meditations before actually receiving tantric empowerments for the Diamond Vehicle practices—and all of this would be integrated within a single curriculum.
This systematic approach produced elaborate theoretical frameworks explaining how preliminary meditation practices develop foundational capacities, how specific antidotes counteract specific obstacles, and how graduated paths unfold in increasingly subtle investigations and realizations at each stage along the journey.
When Westerners encounter “Tibetan Buddhism,” they’re often encountering this comprehensive meditation curriculum—training that assumes we need all three vehicles’ methods to investigate mind fully. This differs from Southeast Theravāda (emphasizing Small Vehicle methods) or East Asian Mahāyāna schools (emphasizing Great Vehicle methods within their particular traditions).
Why Tibet Preserved All Three Vehicles
Over several centuries (roughly 650-1200 CE), Tibetan scholars undertook a massive translation project, rendering Indian Buddhist texts into Tibetan. This wasn’t merely academic work—it was creating a complete meditation library in a new language. Every instruction for practice, every philosophical analysis, every tantric visualization had to be translated with precision sufficient for practitioners to actually use them.
Tibet was positioned to receive all three vehicles before Buddhism largely disappeared from India. Southeast Asia received primarily Small Vehicle teachings. East Asia received primarily Great Vehicle teachings. But Tibet—arriving later to Buddhism—received the full range of what had developed in India over 1,500 years.
This is what made Tibet unique: developing integrated curricula that teach all three vehicles in systematic relationship to each other. The Palace of Learning follows the Tibetan integrated approach because it’s the only tradition that preserved all three vehicles together and worked out how to teach them as progressive stages of a single contemplative investigation.
The Three Vehicles and Palace Structure
Now we can understand why the Palace of Learning has the architecture it does.
Three Floors, Three Vehicles
The three upper floors of the Palace correspond directly to the three vehicles that developed in India and were uniquely preserved together in Tibet:
Small Vehicle Floor (Hīnayāna) — Systematic investigation through theories and practices aimed at individual liberation. We learn how to investigate impermanence, suffering, and the path to freedom directly in our own experience.
Great Vehicle Floor (Mahāyāna) — Investigation expands to include benefiting others through theories and practices that work with emptiness and compassion together. We learn how meditation transforms from individual liberation to developing capacity to help all beings.
Diamond Vehicle Floor (Vajrayāna) — Advanced methods building on the foundation of the previous two floors through tantric theories and practices. We learn techniques that weren’t conceived in earlier vehicles. The diamond vehicle section culminates in the Great Symbol (mahāmudrā) practice. The Great Perfection (dzogchen) is represented as the golden roof of the Palace of Learning because it retrospectively revisits all earlier practices on the path from a bird’s eye view above.
Why This Sequence Matters
The Palace architecture isn’t arbitrary. Each floor builds on what came before—you can’t skip ahead without the prior foundation. Just as the vehicles emerged historically in response to genuine questions practitioners asked, the curriculum presents them in the sequence that supports actual learning.
The questions that motivated each vehicle’s emergence are questions that naturally arise through serious practice: First we ask “How do I free myself from suffering?” Then “Is individual awakening enough, or must my investigation include helping others?” Then “Can we develop more direct methods for working with consciousness itself?”
Historical development equals pedagogical sequence. The way Buddhism evolved over 1,500 years in India reflects the natural progression of deepening investigation.
What Tibet Preserved
What Tibet preserved wasn’t just texts or rituals but this integrated curriculum—a sophisticated explanation of how all three vehicles work together as progressive stages of investigation, each answering questions the previous one raises.
Southeast Theravāda presents the path to awakening by explaining Small Vehicle methods. East Asian Mahāyāna describes the path according to the Great Vehicle approach. But only the Tibetan tradition presents all three vehicles comparatively in systematic relationship to each other. Students don’t need to accept the Tibetan path of moving progressively through increasingly subtle investigations of mind. But it is educationally valuable to understand its logic and theory—even if one has no belief or interest in it—because it clarifies the traditional motivations, purposes, and goals of meditation in ways that allow us to compare Buddhist meditation to contemporary secular mindfulness.
This is what the Palace of Learning provides: access to the complete range of Buddhist meditation methods as an integrated system, presented in the sequence serious Tibetan practitioners have historically followed. A robust comparison to contemporary mindfulness techniques.
What We’ve Covered
We’ve answered the four key questions this module set out to address:
1. What are the three main forms of Buddhism today?
Theravāda (Southeast Asia) — Evolved from Small Vehicle, emphasizes individual liberation
Mahāyāna (East Asia) — Evolved from Great Vehicle, emphasizes benefiting all beings
Vajrayāna (Tibet/Mongolia/Himalayas) — Evolved from Diamond Vehicle, integrated approach using all three vehicles
2. How do forms correlate to the three turnings?
First Turning scriptures (viewpoint on individual liberation) → central to Theravāda
Second Turning scriptures (viewpoint on emptiness and compassion) → central to Mahāyāna
Third Turning scriptures (viewpoint on buddha-nature) → central to Vajrayāna
3. How do turnings relate to the three vehicles?
Small Vehicle = cohesive theories/practices from First Turning (individual liberation)
Great Vehicle = cohesive theories/practices from Second Turning (universal benefit)
Diamond Vehicle = cohesive theories/practices from Third Turning (advanced methods) - Then these vehicles evolved into the three regional forms as Buddhism spread
4. How does Tibetan perspective inform Palace structure? - Tibet uniquely preserved all three vehicles in integrated relationship - Palace has three progressive floors corresponding to three vehicles - Historical development = pedagogical sequence - Best not to skip floors—each builds on previous foundation
Questions for Reflection
You are welcome to explore these questions through ordinary intellectual analysis or, if you choose, through contemplative investigation.
1. What Are You Actually Seeking?
Different vehicles emerged from different questions: individual relief from suffering (Small Vehicle), developing capacity to benefit all beings (Great Vehicle), or accelerated transformation (Diamond Vehicle). What draws you to meditation? Relief from personal suffering? Developing compassion? Understanding reality? Your answer reveals what you’re bringing to the investigation.
2. How Much Guidance?
Small Vehicle emphasizes individual practice with clear instructions. Great Vehicle emphasizes understanding theory alongside practice. Diamond Vehicle requires close teacher supervision. Which fits your temperament—working independently with simple techniques, understanding theory first, or relying on personal guidance?
3. What’s Next?
Foundation provided orientation. What draws you forward? What concerns arise? What remains open that you’d like to investigate?
Continue Your Study
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This module is part of Tarpa's Palace of Learning curriculum, a secular educational program exploring Buddhist philosophy, psychology, and contemplative practice. All content © 2025