The Madhyāntavibhāgakārikā (Chinese: 辯中邊論頌; pinyin: Biàn zhōng biān lùn sòng), or Verses Distinguishing the Middle and the Extremes is a key work in Buddhist philosophy of the Yogacara school attributed in the Tibetan tradition to Maitreya-nātha and in other traditions to Asanga.
The Madhyānta-vibhāga-kārikā consists of 112 verses (kārikā) which delineate the distinctions (vibhāga) and relationship between the middle (madhya) view and the extremes (anta); it contains five chapters: Attributes (laksana), Obscurations (āvarana), Reality (tattva), Cultivation of Antidotes (pratipakṣa-bhāvanā) and the Supreme Way (yānānuttarya).
Along with Chinese, Tibetan and Mongolian translations, the text survives in a single Sanskrit manuscript discovered in Tibet by the Indian Buddhologist and explorer, Rahul Sankrityayan.
An important sub-commentary (tīkā) by Sthiramati also survives in Sanskrit as well as a Tibetan version.
[1] The Madhyāntavibhāga-kārikā has been translated into English at least nine times, often with the Indian commentaries, in the following volumes: