Doctrines and beliefs

Buddha (the enlightened one), dhamma/dharma (the teachings, and the truth) and sangha (the community — monastic and lay). A Buddhist takes refuge in them.

Because the teaching is held to need a community to carry it — which is also why the Vinaya stands first in the Pali Canon.

Existence is unsatisfactory; its cause is craving; if the cause is removed the effect ceases; and a method for removing it exists — the Noble Eightfold Path.

Because it avoids both indulgence and extreme self-denial.

Nothing stays (anicca), so clinging sets a person up for loss (dukkha), and there is no unchanging self that the loss happens to (anatta).

The five aggregates a person is composed of — form, sensation, perception, mental formations and consciousness. Nothing sits behind them.

It explains how one state gives rise to the next, so a process can continue across lives without any permanent self travelling — Buddhism's answer to the objection anatta invites.

Ignorance, desire and aversion.

The bodhisattva — attainment of nirvana not for oneself but Buddhahood for the sake of others — with Avalokiteshvara, Amitabha, Manjushri and the Taras named, and Buddhas in other realms.

Thirty-one planes of existence within three realms. All of them are inside samsara, so a heavenly rebirth is a better turn of the wheel rather than an escape from it.

In the dhamma, in the monastic sangha, in texts whose standing rests on transmission, and in Vajrayana Buddhism in a system of lamas. There is no pope and no binding council.

Lay people aim for punya, merit, to ensure a good rebirth; monks aim for nirvana. In Mahayana all can aim for nirvana and the higher goal of Buddhahood.

Theravada — "the Way of the Elders", the original form. Mahayana — "the Great Vehicle". Vajrayana — "the Diamond Vehicle".

Ch'an Buddhism in China, and Zen and Pure Land Buddhism in Japan.

Devotion to Amitabha Buddha and the aspiration to rebirth in his Pure Land. It is the most devotional Buddhist form and the least dependent on monastic practice.

Direct insight through meditation, emphasised over textual study — striking in a tradition where scriptural knowledge is elsewhere prized.

Theravada: Siddhartha Gotama, the historical Buddha. Mahayana: the historical Buddha and prominent bodhisattvas.

Because if doctrine can come from bodhisattvas too, the canon can grow, new practices can be authorised, and Buddhahood can be held open to everyone. Every Mahayana distinctive follows from it.

The spread of Buddhism and adaptations in the West — which tend to foreground meditation and downplay the monastic and merit structures that carry Buddhism in Asia.