Avidyā (Sanskrit: अविद्या; Pali: 𑀅𑀯𑀺𑀚𑁆𑀚𑀸, romanized: avijjā; Tibetan phonetic: ma rigpa) in Buddhist literature is commonly translated as "ignorance".
[17] The term includes not only ignorance out of darkness, but also obscuration, misconceptions, mistaking illusion to be reality or impermanent to be permanent or suffering to be bliss or non-self to be self (delusions).
In other contexts, Avidya includes not knowing or not understanding the nature of phenomena as impermanent, the Four Noble Truths,[8] other Buddhist doctrines, or the path to end suffering.
[19][20] Sonam Rinchen states Avidya in the context of the twelve links, that "[Ignorance] is the opposite of the understanding that the person or other phenomena lack intrinsic existence.
[28][29][30] Bhikkhu Bodhi states that Avidya is an important part of the Theravada Abhidharma teachings about dependent arising about conditions that sustain the wheel of birth and death.
[31] The Mahayana tradition considers ignorance about the nature of reality and immemorial past lives to be a primordial force, which can only be broken through the insight of Emptiness (sunyata).
[34] The Vajrayana tradition considers ignorance as fetters of bondage into samsara, and its teachings have focused on a Tantric path under the guidance of a teacher, to remove Avidya and achieve liberation in a single lifetime.
This theory, presented in Samyutta Nikaya II.2–4 and Digha Nikaya II.55–63, asserts that rebirth, re-aging and re-death ultimately arise through a series of twelve links or nidanas ultimately rooted in Avidyā, and the twelfth step Jarāmaraṇa triggers the dependent origination of Avidyā, recreating an unending cycle of dukkha (suffering, pain, unsatisfactoriness).