---
title: "The Three Schemata and the Pedagogy of Disposition"
author: "Shi Huijing (釋慧鏡)"
series: "S3 Hundred Dharmas · Supplement SUP02"
series_short: "S3"
paper_id: "S3-SUP02"
paper_number: 2
date: "2026-06"
version: "1.0"
license: "CC BY-NC-SA 4.0"
translation_note: "English mirror of the Chinese v1.0 (B1: direct mirror). Canonical passages translated by the author unless noted; T-numbers and fascicles verified against the CBETA electronic Tripiṭaka per the Chinese edition."
---
# The Three Schemata and the Pedagogy of Disposition

**Why the Buddha Taught Aggregates, Bases, and Elements — The Threefold Difference of Delusion, Faculty, and Inclination**

*三科對機：為何佛說蘊處界三種——愚、根、樂三差別*

## Abstract

After studying the five aggregates, twelve bases, and eighteen elements, a sharp question arises: why did the Buddha teach three classificatory schemes? If they are merely three ways of listing the same content, are they not redundant? This paper argues the contrary: the three schemata (skandha-āyatana-dhātu) are not three inventories but three dissecting blades of differing resolution—their varied folding and unfolding of categories is itself an act of pedagogical responsiveness to disposition (對機). The paper first returns to the *Saṃyukta-āgama*'s Khandha-, Saḷāyatana-, and Dhātu-saṃyuktas to show that the three schemata originate in the living scene of the Buddha's teaching, responsive to each listener. It then reads the *Heart Sūtra*'s serial negation of all three schemes as the Prajñāpāramitā's own use of the threefold scheme. Following the *Abhidharmakośa* fascicle one—"because of the threefold difference of delusion, faculty, and inclination, the aggregates, bases, and elements are taught as three"—it demonstrates the folding mechanism item by item: the aggregate-scheme collapses matter and unfolds mind, treating those deluded about the mental; the base-scheme unfolds matter and collapses mind, treating those deluded about the material; the element-scheme unfolds both, treating those deluded about both. Each scheme thus dissolves one species of self-grasping—the grasping of mind as self, of an external world, of a knower. The paper argues why no scheme is dispensable, aligns all three as alternate analyses of the truth of suffering, and closes with a heuristic analogy from diagnostic imaging: the compassion of pedagogy lies not in giving more, but in giving the right resolution.

## 摘要

學完五蘊、十二處、十八界，一個尖銳的疑問隨之而起：佛為何要說三套分類？本文主張：三科不是三份清單，而是三把解析度不同的解剖刀——其開合之所以各異，是「對機」。三科各破一執：破執心為我、破執有外境、破執有能識。對機之慈悲，不在多予，而在給對解析度。

**Keywords:** three schemata, aggregates-bases-elements (skandha-āyatana-dhātu), pedagogy of disposition (對機), threefold difference of delusion-faculty-inclination (愚根樂三差別), unfolding-the-mental / unfolding-the-material / unfolding-both (迷心開心、迷色開色、俱迷俱開), suffering (duḥkha-satya), self-view (satkāya-dṛṣṭi), Abhidharmakośa, Saṃyukta-āgama, Heart Sūtra

---

## I. Introduction: Three Lists, or Three Blades?

The preceding eleven papers unfolded the hundred dharmas one by one, from the general framework to the form dharmas; the S2 papers, in turn, illumined the five aggregates as empty within prajñā. The reader now holds three things: the five aggregates, the twelve bases, the eighteen elements. All three enumerate the same matter—this body-mind that is mistaken for a "self."

A question therefore cannot be avoided: **if what is being counted is one and the same body-mind, why count it three times?**

If the three schemata were merely three arrangements of the same content, then learning two extra sets would be nothing but memorizing two extra lists—and this is precisely what Pointing-at-the-Moon guards against most: piling up concepts *on top of* "seeing-through and untying," rather than doing the untying. Were that the case, the twelve bases and eighteen elements could be discarded and the five aggregates alone would suffice.

This paper argues the opposite. The three schemata are not three lists; they are **three blades of differing resolution**. One and the same body-mind: the aggregates dissect it at one fineness, the bases at another, the elements at a third. And the reason the resolution differs is not arbitrary—it is **responsiveness to disposition** (對機). The Buddha looks not at "how to classify most exhaustively," but at "where, in the person before me, is the grasping of self lodged?" The blade must fall on the lodging-place: grasping at mind, then unfold the mental; grasping at matter, then unfold the material; grasping at both, then unfold both.

This is the paper's core thesis: **the difference among aggregates, bases, and elements lies not in content but in folding; and the folding is as it is because of disposition.** To make this clear is to return the three schemata to their original identity—instruments for breaking attachment, not academic taxonomy.

What follows first returns to scriptural evidence (the scene in the Āgama, the negation in prajñā), then sets out the doctrinal grounds (the Kośa's threefold difference of delusion, faculty, and inclination), then builds the argument (unfolding *is* breaking attachment; why no scheme is dispensable; the join with the Four Truths), and finally clears away misreadings through a middle-way correction.

---

## II. Canonical Foundations

### A. The Sūtra Corpus

#### 2.1 The Āgama: Responsiveness Was the Buddha's Living Scene

Responsiveness to disposition is not an invention of the Abhidharma masters; it is the very texture of the Buddha's teaching scene. Open the *Saṃyukta-āgama* and the three schemata are not laid out as a table and delivered at once; they fall across different *saṃyuttas* (connected collections), arising with different audiences and different problems.

In the Aggregates collection (Khandha-saṃyukta), to those who grasped body-mind as permanent and as self, the Buddha taught the five clinging-aggregates as impermanent, suffering, and not-self:

> Form is not self. Were form the self, form would not yield to sickness and pain… Because form is without self, sickness and pain arise in form. So too with feeling, perception, formations, and consciousness. The well-instructed noble disciple contemplates these five clinging-aggregates as not-self and not-belonging-to-self, as they truly are.[^1] *(trans. mine)*

In the Bases collection (Saḷāyatana-saṃyukta), to those entangled at the six sense-doors and flowing along after objects, he spoke through the gates of faculty and object:

> Conditioned by eye and form, eye-consciousness arises… so likewise for ear, nose, tongue, body, and mind.[^2] *(trans. mine)*

In the Elements collection (Dhātu-saṃyukta), he disclosed through the manifold elements that faculty, object, and consciousness cannot be grasped as self:

> Because of the diversity of elements, diverse contacts arise; because of diverse contacts, diverse feelings arise.[^3] *(trans. mine)*

In other words, **the three schemata are three distinct conversations, not a three-column table.** The Buddha did not decide a priori that body-mind "ought to be divided into aggregates, bases, and elements" and then announce it; he faced particular persons—wherever this one was stuck, he used that resolution to loosen it. Aggregates, bases, elements are three responses, not three definitions. The Pali corresponds: Khandha-saṃyutta (SN 22), Saḷāyatana-saṃyutta (SN 35), Dhātu-saṃyutta (SN 14) stand as separate divisions, each with its own occasion.[^4] On this, Chinese and Pali transmissions agree: the root of the three schemata is sunk in the scene of teaching, not in the topical outline of a treatise.

#### 2.2 Prajñā: The *Heart Sūtra* Negates Along the Three Schemata

The three schemata are not the business of Abhidharma and Āgama alone; when Prajñāpāramitā illumines emptiness, the sequence it follows is precisely aggregates, bases, elements. The negations of the *Heart Sūtra* run in a single breath:

> Therefore in emptiness there is no form, no feeling, perception, formations, or consciousness *(negating the five aggregates)*; no eye, ear, nose, tongue, body, or mind, no form, sound, smell, taste, touch, or dharma *(negating the twelve bases)*; no eye-element, up to no mind-consciousness-element *(negating the eighteen elements)*.[^5]

This is a decisive stroke: prajñā negates "self" not by uttering a blanket "no-self," but by **negating along the three schemata in turn**—first the five aggregates, then the twelve bases, then the eighteen elements. Why does prajñā too proceed by the three schemata? Because the breaking of attachment must break at the lodging-place of attachment; beings grasp body-mind as real, and that grasp is distributed across the three sites of "mind, matter, knower," so prajñā too must follow the threefold sequence, negating site by site. In the Āgama the three schemata are "unfolded to show"; in prajñā they are "veiled to empty"—the directions of unfolding and veiling are opposite, yet the three points where the blade falls are exactly the same. This is the mirror image, within the gate of prajñā, of what this paper calls "responsive folding." (For a segment-by-segment exposition of the *Heart Sūtra*'s threefold negation, see the canonical-translation axis, Heart Sūtra movement six.)

### B. The Treatise Corpus

#### 2.3 The *Abhidharmakośa*: The Threefold Difference of Delusion, Faculty, and Inclination

The living wisdom of the Āgama is, in the *Abhidharmakośa* fascicle one (Exposition of the Elements), crystallized into principle. Vasubandhu first fixes the meaning of the three schemata in a single verse:

> Heap, gateway-of-arising, lineage—these are the meanings of aggregate, base, and element.[^6]

Aggregate is "heap" (rāśi, the sense of accumulation); base is "gateway-of-arising" (āyadvāra, the door through which mind and mental factors grow); element is "lineage" (gotra, the sense of kind or family). The three schemata are three ways of *dividing* the same body-mind—viewing it as heap, viewing it by gateway, viewing it by kind.

Why divided into three? Vasubandhu sets a further verse to gather the rationale of responsiveness:

> Because of the threefold difference of delusion, faculty, and inclination, the aggregates, bases, and elements are taught as three.[^7]

The prose commentary explains the three differences: the Buddha teaches the three schemata in response to three classes of beings—differing in what they are deluded about (delusion), in the keenness of their faculties (faculty), and in their preference (inclination). This is a three-by-three matrix of responsiveness:

- **By "delusion" (the bias of what one mistakes):** to those deluded about mind (mind and mental factors), he teaches the five aggregates—matter collapsed into one, mind unfolded into the four of feeling, perception, formations, and consciousness—so they may see that "mind" is neither one nor self. To those deluded about matter, he teaches the twelve bases—mind abbreviated to the mind-base, matter unfolded into the five faculties and five objects, ten material bases—so they may see that "matter" is a construct of the doorways. To those deluded about both mind and matter, he teaches the eighteen elements—matter unfolded into ten, mind into the seven mind-elements plus the dharma-element—both spread fully open.
- **By "faculty" (keen to dull):** the keen awaken at a concise telling, so are taught the aggregates (most concise); the middling are taught the bases; the dull require an extensive telling, so are taught the elements (most extensive).
- **By "inclination" (preference for the brief or the extensive):** those who prefer brevity are taught the aggregates, those of middling preference the bases, those who prefer fullness the elements. This concerns not the keenness of faculty but the temper of preference.

Taken together: **what one mistakes, what one can bear, what one prefers—all three differ; hence the folding varies threefold.** The content is one and the same body-mind; the resolution becomes three according to the person.

#### 2.4 The *Mahāvibhāṣā*: A Fuller Exposition of the Establishing of the Three Schemata

The *Abhidharma-mahāvibhāṣā*, prior to the Kośa, already expounds at length the grounds for establishing the three schemata, with the same import as the Kośa's threefold difference: the Buddha, according to the differences in beings' faculties and inclinations, now collapses and now unfolds, setting forth aggregates, bases, and elements so that each may find entry.[^8] This attests that "responsive folding" is not the doctrine of the Kośa alone, but a principle of scriptural exposition held in common by the Abhidharma.

#### 2.5 The *Hundred Dharmas Treatise* and *Cheng Weishi Lun*: The Element-Gate Unfolded to Its Limit

Yogācāra inherits the three schemata and advances further. The *Treatise on the Hundred Dharmas* opens by listing the hundred dharmas in five categories, placing the mind-dharmas first "as foremost of all."[^9] Among them, the single consciousness-aggregate, named simply "consciousness" in the Āgama, is in Yogācāra unfolded into eight consciousnesses—the six of eye, ear, nose, tongue, body, mind, plus manas and ālaya.

This is precisely the result of pushing the "element-gate's unfolding" to its limit: the "seven mind-elements" of the eighteen (the six consciousness-elements plus the mind-element) are, in Yogācāra, finely analyzed into the complete structure of the eight consciousnesses (unfolded one by one across S3-P02 through P06). In other words, the "element" gate of the three schemata, unfolding mind to its utmost, arrives at the Yogācāra doctrine of the eight consciousnesses. The *Cheng Weishi Lun*'s sense of "consciousness-transformation"—all form-dharmas being the perceived-aspect transformed by consciousness[^10]—then gathers the "base-gate's unfolding of matter" back into consciousness: the so-called ten material bases, too, are not apart from consciousness. The folding of the three schemata finds, within Yogācāra, a deeper unity: unfolded to the end, all three return to a single transformation of consciousness.

---

## III. Core Arguments

### 3.1 Responsive Folding: The Difference Lies Not in Content but in Folding

✅ **Core thesis: Aggregates, bases, and elements enumerate one and the same body-mind; their difference lies not in the content enumerated but in the distribution of "unfolding" and "collapsing"—which class of dharmas is spread out and which gathered in varies according to disposition.**

Laid side by side, the three schemata cut the same body-mind with three strokes: the aggregates collapse matter into one and spread mind into four; the bases collapse mind into the mind-base (with the dharma-base) and spread matter into ten; the elements spread both mind and matter into eighteen. All three cut the same block; the whole difference is in "where to make a few more cuts." That place of "more cuts" is unfolding; the place "gathered and left undivided" is collapsing. Responsiveness is deciding, according to where the listener's self-grasping lodges, where the blade falls densely and where sparsely.

### 3.2 Unfolding-the-Mental, Unfolding-the-Material, Unfolding-Both

✅ **Core thesis: The direction of the three schemata's folding corresponds precisely to where each of three kinds of self-grasping is lodged—to unfold at the lodging-place is to break at the lodging-place.**

- **Aggregates = deluded-about-mind, so unfold the mental.** One who grasps mind as self takes the various mental activities, lumped together, as an "I" that feels, thinks, and decides. The aggregate-gate unfolds this "mind-self" into the four of feeling, perception, formations, and consciousness—each arising and ceasing on its own, none a master running through them. Once mind is seen as four streams, "grasping mind as one self" has nowhere to stand.
- **Bases = deluded-about-matter, so unfold the material.** One who grasps matter as real takes the material body and external objects as solidly, independently "out there." The base-gate unfolds matter into the five faculties and five objects, ten bases—the so-called external object being nothing but a construct of dependent arising at the six doorways, with no object subsisting apart from faculty.
- **Elements = deluded-about-both, so unfold both.** One deluded about both mind and matter needs the most thorough spreading-open. The element-gate sets out all eighteen elements of faculty, object, and consciousness, so one sees that faculty is no master-knower, object no real known, and consciousness no independent knower-power; the three arise interdependently, none establishable as "that I which knows the world." This is the Yogācāra pivot: grasper and grasped alike removed, consciousness too without self-nature.

### 3.3 Three Blades, Three Resolutions: Unfolding *Is* Breaking Attachment

✅ **Core thesis: "Unfolding" can "break" because self-grasping always grasps at "one"; to spread what seemed an undivided whole into the many, into conditioned assemblage, is to void the foothold of "grasping it as one self." Unfolding is not the addition of knowledge; it is the dismantling of the "illusion of a unitary whole" on which self-grasping depends.**

This is where the three schemata join Pointing-at-the-Moon's subtractive purpose. The three schemata are not three layers of concept to memorize; they are three ways of laying the blade for "seeing-through." Aggregates break the grasping of mind, bases the grasping of an external world, elements the grasping of a knower. The joy-in-dharma of studying the three schemata lies not in having learned two more taxonomies, but in recognizing: the Buddha never asked me to install anything more—he only changed the angle three times, dismantling for me the same illusion of "self."

### 3.4 Why No Scheme Is Dispensable

✅ **Core thesis: The three schemata have no hierarchy, only responsiveness. Hence one cannot discard aggregates and bases because "elements are most complete," nor discard bases and elements because "aggregates are most concise"—to discard any one is to discard the point of entry for a class of dispositions.**

One might ask: since the element-gate's unfolding is most thorough, why not use the elements alone and discard aggregates and bases? Answer: for a keen-faculty person who grasps only mind as self, the eighteen elements are the long way around—what he needs is the directness of that single stroke of the aggregate-gate. Conversely, for a dull-faculty person who grasps the material body as real, the five aggregates collapse matter into one aggregate and thus skip past his lodging-place; only the base-gate's unfolding of matter meets him. **It is not that one scheme is higher, but which scheme meets the lock before one's eyes.** The three schemata are mutually indispensable precisely because the dispositions to be met are themselves of three kinds; to discard a scheme is to abandon a class of beings outside the gate. Here lies the whole compassion of responsive folding: what is given is not the most exhaustive set, but the set that meets you.

### 3.5 All Three Schemata Are Alternate Gates to the Truth of Suffering

✅ **Core thesis: The three schemata are simultaneously three analyses of the truth of suffering. The content of the truth of suffering does not change (the oppressive nature of conditioned body-mind is suffering); its analytic resolution likewise becomes three according to disposition.**

Among the Four Noble Truths, the standard definition of the truth of suffering is "in brief, the five clinging-aggregates are suffering"[^11]—this is the aggregate-gate's statement of the truth of suffering. Yet for one deluded about matter, the truth of suffering may be stated through the base-gate: the oppressive pursuit of six faculties after six objects is suffering; for one deluded about both, through the element-gate: the arising-and-ceasing continuity of the eighteen elements is suffering. The truth of suffering is the common terminus of the three schemata: what all three disclose is, in the end, the same—"the body-mind in which self is lodged is, by nature, suffering." Responsive folding thus operates not only on the *constitution* of "self" (aggregates-bases-elements) but runs through the teaching of the Four Truths itself—the three schemata are three faces of the truth of suffering. Here only the join is marked; the full span of responsiveness across the Four Truths is treated elsewhere, in the Four-Truths thread.

---

## IV. Cross-Disciplinary Resonance

⚠️ **What follows is a heuristic analogy, not a theoretical equivalence; per the argument of §III, no analogy is used as ground. This section is brief, placing a single image to aid comprehension.**

### 4.1 Responsiveness and the Resolution of Diagnostic Imaging

A good physician facing a lesion does not run X-ray, ultrasound, CT, and MRI all at once; he selects the one imaging modality most fitting to the location and nature of the lesion. A fracture needs only an X-ray; soft-tissue pathology needs MRI—resolution is not better-the-higher, but better-the-fitter. Excessive imaging is useless for diagnosis and merely adds burden and noise.

The responsive folding of the three schemata is structurally similar: aggregates, bases, and elements—three resolutions—are not three sets of knowledge for one to collect, but three blades for the teacher to select according to the student's lodging-place of grasping. Grasping at mind, use the aggregates (one stroke unfolding mind); grasping at matter, the bases (one stroke unfolding matter); grasping at both, the elements (unfold both). Give the right one, not more. The image serves comprehension only; the doctrinal demonstration of the three schemata is in §III, not here.

---

## V. Middle-Way Corrections

### ❌ Misreading 1: The three schemata form a hierarchy (elements highest, aggregates shallowest)

The three schemata have no hierarchy, only responsiveness. That the element-gate is broadest does not make it most ultimate; that the aggregate-gate is most concise does not make it shallowest. For a keen-faculty person who grasps at mind, the aggregates are a direct and ultimate stroke; for a dull-faculty person deluded about both, only the elements meet him. To rank them by the number of dharmas is precisely to mistake "the skillful means of responsiveness" for "a hierarchy of doctrine." Concise is not shallow, broad is not high; only responsiveness is the measure.

### ❌ Misreading 2: Since it is responsive, two schemes may be discarded and one kept

Responsiveness is exactly the reason none may be discarded (see 3.4). The dispositions to be met are themselves of three kinds; each scheme meets one. To discard a scheme is to abandon a class of dispositions. Keep only the element-gate, and the keen who prefer brevity take the long way and lose joy-in-dharma; keep only the aggregate-gate, and those who grasp matter skip their lodging-place and their contemplation falls empty. The three schemata are three different keys, not three copies of one key.

### ❌ Misreading 3: Responsiveness = relativism (no objective truth)

What responsiveness folds is "resolution," not "truth." The single fact the three schemata point to—body-mind is without self, its nature is suffering—does not change with disposition. What changes is only the fineness and sequence of entry. Responsiveness is the skillfulness of compassion (setting forth according to disposition), not the relativizing of truth (no fixed dharma whatsoever). To read responsiveness as "each person has their own truth" is to mistake the diversity of means for a divergence in the ultimate.

### ❌ Misreading 4: The three schemata are three sets of knowledge to memorize

The three schemata are not three lists to be recited but three ways of laying the blade to see through self-grasping (see 3.3). To collect the three schemata as knowledge is to fall into the very "piling-up of concepts" Pointing-at-the-Moon guards against most—adding one more bond on top of untying. The use of the three schemata is not in "knowing" but in "cutting": see where your own grasping lodges, and take up the scheme that meets it for deep contemplation. To have them by heart yet never lay a single blade is to leave the three schemata, for you, three dead diagrams.

---

## VI. Responsiveness for Today: Give the Right One, Not More

Set the responsive principle of the three schemata in our own time, and it answers a question today's reader most easily misunderstands: in studying the Dharma, is more always better?

The three schemata answer no. Facing one deluded about mind, the Buddha would not force the eighteen elements on him because they are "more complete"; he gives the five aggregates, because that blade meets this person's lodging-place. **The wisdom of responsiveness is the wisdom of subtraction—not giving you every resolution, but recognizing which one you need at this moment, and giving only that.**

For today's practitioner, then, two implications. First, **no need to crave more**: see where your own grasping lodges and take up the one scheme that meets it for deep contemplation; you need not practice all three at once and turn them into a burden. Second, **no need to slight the concise**: the five aggregates, though most concise, are for the keen and for those who grasp mind as self already an ultimate stroke; the twelve bases and eighteen elements each have their own irreplaceable occasion.

This is responsiveness, returning to Pointing-at-the-Moon's polestar: true joy-in-dharma has never been the satiety of "having understood one more set," but the release of "so this one blade falls exactly on the self-grasping I had hidden so long." Give the right one, not more—this is the compassion of the Buddha's teaching the three schemata, and the savor of dharma the reader of the three schemata should receive.

---

## VII. Conclusion: Three Blades, One Self-Grasping

The three schemata are not three lists; they are three blades of differing resolution.

The argument of this paper may be gathered into a single line. In **scriptural evidence**, the three schemata arise in the living scene of the Āgama's teaching (the Aggregates, Bases, and Elements collections each meeting their occasion), while the Prajñāpāramitā *Heart Sūtra* negates along the three schemata in turn, showing that the breaking of attachment must break at the lodging-place. In **doctrinal grounds**, the Kośa establishes the matrix of responsiveness with "because of the threefold difference of delusion, faculty, and inclination, the aggregates, bases, and elements are taught as three," the Mahāvibhāṣā expands it, and Yogācāra pushes the element-gate's unfolding to the limit of the eight consciousnesses. In **argument**, the difference among the schemata lies not in content but in folding, and the direction of folding corresponds precisely to three kinds of self-grasping—aggregates collapse matter and unfold mind (breaking the grasping of mind as self), bases unfold matter and collapse mind (breaking the grasping of an external world), elements unfold both (breaking the grasping of a knower)—and "unfolding" can "break" precisely because unfolding dismantles the "illusion of a unitary whole" on which self-grasping rests.

Thus the three schemata are mutually indispensable: the dispositions to be met are of three kinds, each scheme meets one, and to discard any is to abandon a class of beings outside the gate. The three schemata have no hierarchy, only responsiveness; their compassion lies not in giving more, but in giving the right resolution. And all three are alternate gates to the truth of suffering, pointing in the end to one fact—this body-mind mistaken for "self" is impermanent, without self, and by nature suffering.

So we return to the polestar of Pointing-at-the-Moon: the three's being three is not to have you collect two more taxonomies, but that the Buddha has readied three blades, waiting for you to recognize where your own long-hidden self-grasping is lodged—in mind, in matter, or in "knowing" itself—and then to take up the one that meets it, and cut.

What is learned is not three sets of classification to memorize, but three ways of seeing through one and the same self-grasping. This is the whole of "The Three Schemata and the Pedagogy of Disposition." The cutting begins with recognizing where your grasping lodges.

---

## References

### A. Primary Buddhist Sources

- *Saṃyukta-āgama* (雜阿含經), trans. Guṇabhadra, Taishō vol. 2, No. 0099.
- *Prajñāpāramitā-hṛdaya-sūtra / Heart Sūtra* (般若波羅蜜多心經), trans. Xuanzang, Taishō vol. 8, No. 0251.
- *Abhidharmakośa-bhāṣya* (阿毗達磨俱舍論), by Vasubandhu, trans. Xuanzang, Taishō vol. 29, No. 1558.
- *Abhidharmakośa* (old translation, 阿毗達磨俱舍釋論), trans. Paramārtha, Taishō vol. 29, No. 1559.
- *Abhidharma-mahāvibhāṣā* (阿毗達磨大毗婆沙論), trans. Xuanzang, Taishō vol. 27, No. 1545.
- *Mahāyāna-śatadharma-prakāśamukha-śāstra / Treatise on the Hundred Dharmas* (大乘百法明門論), by Vasubandhu, trans. Xuanzang, Taishō vol. 31, No. 1614.
- *Cheng Weishi Lun / Demonstration of Consciousness-Only* (成唯識論), by Dharmapāla et al., trans. Xuanzang, Taishō vol. 31, No. 1585.

### B. Modern Scholarship

- This paper grounds its demonstration in canonical texts and does not argue from modern disciplines; §IV places a single heuristic analogy only, citing no modern work.

### C. Sūtra & Śāstra Index

| No. | Title | Taishō vol. | Number | Cited in this paper |
|-----|-------|-------------|--------|---------------------|
| 1 | Saṃyukta-āgama | T2 | No. 0099 | Khandha-, Saḷāyatana-, Dhātu-saṃyuktas; truth of suffering |
| 2 | Heart Sūtra | T8 | No. 0251 | Threefold-negation passage (no form … no mind-consciousness-element) |
| 3 | Abhidharmakośa | T29 | No. 1558 | Fasc. 1, Exposition of Elements (definition verse; delusion-faculty-inclination verse) |
| 4 | Mahāvibhāṣā | T27 | No. 1545 | Fuller exposition of establishing the three schemata |
| 5 | Treatise on the Hundred Dharmas | T31 | No. 1614 | Opening list of the five categories |
| 6 | Cheng Weishi Lun | T31 | No. 1585 | Consciousness-transformation; unfolding of the eight consciousnesses |

---

## Cross-Reference Index (Series Papers & Warp-Weft Threads)

| Item | Relation to this paper |
|------|------------------------|
| S3-P01 All Dharmas Without Self: The Hundred-Dharma Framework | The element-gate's "unfolding both" becomes, in Yogācāra, the eight consciousnesses; §2.5 builds on P01's analysis of the consciousness-aggregate |
| S3-P02 Three Transformations: Panorama of the Eight Consciousnesses | Seven mind-elements → eight consciousnesses, the limit of the element-gate's unfolding of mind (§2.5) |
| S3-P04 Manas: The Invisible Ego | Doctrinal basis for the element-gate's "breaking the grasping of a knower" (§3.2, element cell) |
| S2-P04 Seeing the Five Aggregates as Empty | Upstream of prajñā's aggregate-gate negation (§2.2) |
| S2-P07 In Emptiness No Form: Awareness of Faculty-Object-Consciousness | Upstream of prajñā's base/element-gate negation (§2.2) |
| Canonical axis: Heart Sūtra movement six (§14–§17) | Scriptural anchor for the segment-by-segment exposition of the threefold negation (§2.2) |
| thread｜self/wuyun | This paper is the authoritative source for wuyun's View-axis cell ("why divided thus") |
| thread｜self/shierchu | Authoritative source for shierchu's View-axis cell (unfolding-the-material) |
| thread｜self/shibajie | Authoritative source for shibajie's View-axis cell (unfolding-both / Yogācāra pivot) |
| thread｜causation/sishengdi | §3.5 joins the Four-Truths responsiveness cell (three schemata as alternate gates to suffering) |

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## Footnotes

[^1]: *Saṃyukta-āgama*, fasc. 2, Khandha-saṃyukta, "form is not self … because form is without self, sickness and pain arise in form" and "the well-instructed noble disciple contemplates these five clinging-aggregates as not-self and not-belonging-to-self, as they truly are"; the no-self argument (form is without self because uncontrollable), Taishō vol. 2, No. 0099.

[^2]: *Saṃyukta-āgama*, fasc. 8, Saḷāyatana-saṃyukta, "conditioned by eye and form, eye-consciousness arises," etc.; the faculty-object gate of the six inner and outer bases, Taishō vol. 2, No. 0099.

[^3]: *Saṃyukta-āgama*, fasc. 16, Dhātu-saṃyukta, "because of the diversity of elements, diverse contacts arise"; the conditioned arising of diverse elements, Taishō vol. 2, No. 0099.

[^4]: Pali correspondence: *Saṃyutta-nikāya*, Khandha-saṃyutta (SN 22), Saḷāyatana-saṃyutta (SN 35), Dhātu-saṃyutta (SN 14). The threefold division broadly parallels the Chinese.

[^5]: *Heart Sūtra*, "therefore in emptiness there is no form, no feeling, perception, formations, or consciousness; no eye, ear, nose, tongue, body, or mind; no form, sound, smell, taste, touch, or dharma; no eye-element, up to no mind-consciousness-element"; prajñā negating along the three schemata in turn, Taishō vol. 8, No. 0251.

[^6]: *Abhidharmakośa*, fasc. 1, Exposition of Elements, "heap, gateway-of-arising, lineage—these are the meanings of aggregate, base, and element"; the definition verse of the three schemata (aggregate = heap, base = gateway, element = lineage), Taishō vol. 29, No. 1558.

[^7]: *Abhidharmakośa*, fasc. 1, Exposition of Elements, "because of the threefold difference of delusion, faculty, and inclination, the aggregates, bases, and elements are taught as three"; the matrix verse and Vasubandhu's prose exposition of the three differences (the prose specifies delusion as threefold—of the mental, of the material, or of both; faculty as sharp, middling, and dull; inclination as for the brief, the middling, and the extensive), Taishō vol. 29, No. 1558. Paramārtha's old translation (No. 1559) differs in wording, same in import.

[^8]: *Abhidharma-mahāvibhāṣā*, fasc. 71, the fuller exposition of the grounds for establishing the three schemata (setting forth aggregates-bases-elements as the "extensive-and-concise three" according to delusion, faculty, and inclination), Taishō vol. 27, No. 1545.

[^9]: *Treatise on the Hundred Dharmas*, "as foremost of all" places the mind-dharmas first among the five categories, Taishō vol. 31, No. 1614.

[^10]: *Cheng Weishi Lun*, the sense of consciousness-transformation (all form-dharmas being the perceived-aspect transformed by consciousness) and the unfolding of the eight consciousnesses, Taishō vol. 31, No. 1585.

[^11]: The truth of suffering, "in brief, the five clinging-aggregates are suffering," *Saṃyukta-āgama*, fasc. 13 (Guṇabhadra's rendering reads 五受陰, the older equivalent of Xuanzang's 五取蘊), Taishō vol. 2, No. 0099; Pali correspondence *Dhammacakkappavattana-sutta* (SN 56.11), "saṃkhittena pañcupādānakkhandhā dukkhā."

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*This paper is published under a CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 license. Redistribution and citation are welcome; please cite the source.*
*Scriptural quotations have been cross-checked against the CBETA Chinese Electronic Tripiṭaka Collection.*
*Repository: github.com/pointing-at-the-moon/dharma-research*