Early Buddhism, as embodied in the Pali Nikāyas and the Chinese Āgamas, is radically different from all these schools, at least as far as their philosophical content is concerned.

A brief overview of the development of Buddhist metaphysics from the Early Texts to the Mādhyamikas.

The Abhidhamma Piṭaka reflects the scholastic nature of its origin: the teachings in teachable form. Because of its complexity it outgrew this early role…

His first essay, provocatively titled “The Doctrine of Tathāgata-garbha Is Not Buddhist,” leaves no doubt as to Matsumoto’s position or intent.

An overview of the writings of “Critical Buddhism.”

I investigate the tale of the Buddhaʼs sojourn in the Heaven of the Thirty-three to teach his mother, based on a translation of a version of this episode in the Saṃyukta-āgama preserved in Chinese, with a view to discerning the gradual development and significance of this tale.

At the third council, the Canon was closed. The one, very important, addition that was made was the Kathāvatthu: the final book of the Abhidhamma as a summary of the positions of the various schools that were deemed heretical.

Drawing upon the Yogācārin model, Dharmakīrti explains that the contemplative must first grasp the objects through cognition born of listening, ascertain them through reflection based on reasoning, and finally cognise them through meditative cultivation. This leads to valid perception.

[an] investigation into the notion of citta and the related concepts cetas and cetanā

These are the over two hundred kinds of knowledge that arise in one who develops concentration by mindfulness of breathing with sixteen grounds

… the earliest extant, detailed commentary on Buddhist meditation available in an Indic language

The Path of Discrimination was a key influence on later meditation manuals (such as the medieval Visuddhimagga) and is the oldest such commentary in existence, giving us a rare insight into the early Indian commentarial and meditation traditions.

For a translation of the entire Paṭisambhidāmagga, see SuttaCentral

In the original teachings deeds and their results are presented quite subtly, as everyone, of course, produces many millions of intentional deeds, both good and bad, over the course of their lifetime. And the deeds themselves are often motivated by a mixture of good and bad intentions, which are not purely one or the other.

In the later teachings these subtleties were often obscured by the didactic need to present the message in a clear and unambiguous way, and we find what is in essence a very complex teaching reduced to something rather simplistic: do this bad deed in this life, get a complimentary bad result in the next; do this good deed, get this good result.

The fossils found clearly show that there has been a development from reptile to bird, even though the particular animal whose remains have been discovered was of course not the first one to start jumping or gliding from one tree to the next. Comparable to the fossils of an archaeopteryx, some early discourses reflect particular stages in the development of Buddhist thought.

… the main force of the nikāyas is to discount speculation about nibbāna. It is the summum bonum. To seek to know more is to manufacture obstacles. By the time of the early Abhidhamma the situation is much clearer. The whole Buddhist tradition is agreed that nibbāna is the unconditioned

… while the Theravādins have preserved the clearest and best-understood early texts referring to the in-between state, their philosophical posture prevented them from investigating and describing this in any detail. For that we shall have to listen to the other schools, starting with the Puggalavādins and Sarvāstivādins, as passed down through the Chinese and Tibetan traditions.

A passionate and compelling argument for both “the bardo” (as it’s popularly known) and for contemporary, comparative scholarship.