CHAPTER 29
WHAT IS IT THAT IS REBORN?
(No-Soul)
"Neither the same nor yet another."
-- VISUDDHI MAGGA
Apart
from mind and matter, which constitute this so-called being, Buddhism does
not assert the existence of an immortal soul, or an eternal ego, which man
has obtained in a mysterious way from an equally mysterious source.
A soul which is eternal must necessarily remain
always the same without any change whatever. If the soul which is supposed
to be the essence of man is eternal, there could be neither a rise nor a
fall. Nor could one explain why "different souls are so variously
constituted at the outset."
To justify the existence of endless felicity in
an eternal heaven and unending torment in an eternal hell, it is
absolutely necessary to postulate an immortal soul.
"It should be said,"
writes Bertrand Russell, "that the old distinction between soul and
body has evaporated, quite as much because 'matter' has lost its solidity
as because mind has lost its spirituality. Psychology is just beginning to
be scientific. In the present state of psychology belief in immortality
can at any rate claim no support from science." (Religion and
Science, p. 132.)
According to the learned author of the
Riddle of the Universe:
[1]
"This theological proof that a personal creator
has breathed an immortal soul (generally regarded as a portion of the
Divine Soul) into man is a pure myth. The cosmological proof that the
'moral order of the world' demands the eternal duration of the human soul
is a baseless dogma. The teleological proof that the 'higher destiny' of
man involves the perfecting of his defective, earthly soul beyond the
grave -- rests on a false anthropism. The moral proof -- that the defects
and the unsatisfied desires of earthly existence must be fulfilled by
'compensative justice' on the other side of eternity -- is nothing more
than a pious wish. The ethnological proof -- that the belief in
immortality, like the belief in God, is an innate truth, common to all
humanity -- is an error in fact. The ontological proof -- that the soul,
being a simple, immaterial, and indivisible entity cannot be involved in
the corruption of death -- is based on an entirely erroneous view of the
psychic phenomena it is a spiritualistic fallacy.
All these and similar 'proofs of athanatism' are in a parlous
condition; they are definitely annulled by the scientific criticism of the
last few decades."
If nothing in the form of a spirit or soul
passes from this life to the other, what is it that is reborn?
In this question it is taken for granted that
there is some thing to be reborn.
A few centuries ago it was argued --
"Cogito. ergo sum" (I think, therefore I am). True, but
first it has to be proved that there is an "I" to think.
We say that the sun rises in the East and sets
in the West, although we know that actually it is not so. We have to admit
that one cannot strike an identical place twice although to all appearance
one has done so.
Everything changes so soon. For no two
moments are we identically the same.
Buddhists agree with Bertrand Russell when he
says:
"There is obviously some reason in which I am
the same person as I was yesterday, and, to take an even more obvious
example, if I simultaneously see a man and hear him speaking, there is
some sense in which the I that sees is the same as the I that hears.
[2]"
Until recently scientists believed in an
indivisible and indestructible atom. "For sufficient reasons physicists
have reduced this atom to a series of events; for equally good reasons
psychologists find that mind has not the identity of a single
continuing thing but is a series of occurrences bound together by certain
intimate relations. The question of immortality, therefore, has become the
question whether these intimate
relations exist between occurrences connected with a living body and other
occurrences which take place after that body is dead.
[3]"
As C.E.M. Joad says in The Meaning of Life:
"Matter has since disintegrated under our very
eyes. It is no longer solid; it is no longer enduring; it is no longer
determined by compulsive laws; and more important than all it is no longer
known."
The so-called atoms, it seems, are both
"divisible and destructible." The electrons and protons that compose atoms
"can meet and annihilate one another, while their persistence, such as it
is, is rather that of a wave lacking fixed boundaries, and in process of
continual change both as regards shape and position, than that of a
thing."
Bishop
Berkley, who showed that this so-called atom was a metaphysical
fiction, held that there existed a spiritual substance called a soul.
Hume in
his search after a soul declares:
"There are some philosophers who imagine we are
every moment intimately conscious of what we call our self: that we feel
its existence and its continuance in existence and are certain, beyond the
evidence of a demonstration, both of its
perfect identity and simplicity. For my part, when I enter most
intimately into what I call myself, I always stumble on some particular
perception or other -- of heat or cold, light or shade, love or hatred,
pain or pleasure. I never can catch myself at any time without a
perception, and never can observe anything but the perception...
[4]"
Bergson says:
"All consciousness is time existence; and a
conscious state is not a state that endures without changing. It is a
change without ceasing; when change ceases, it ceases; it is itself
nothing but change."
Watson, a
distinguished psychologist, states:
"No one has ever touched a soul, or has seen
one in a test tube, or has in any way come into relationship with it as he
has with the other objects of his daily experience. Nevertheless to doubt
its existence is to become a heretic, and once might possibly even had led
to the loss of one's head. Even today a man holding a public position dare
not question it .
[5]"
Dealing with this question of soul, Prof. James
writes:
"This soul-theory is a complete superfluity, so
far as according for the actually verified facts of conscious experience
goes. So far no one can be compelled to subscribe to it for definite
scientific reasons.
"This me is an empirical aggregate of things
objectively known. The I which knows them cannot itself be an aggregate,
neither for psychological purpose need it be considered to be an
unchanging metaphysical entity like the soul, or a principal like the pure
Ego viewed as out of time. It is a thought, at each moment different from
that of the last moment, but appropriative of the latter, together with
all that the latter calls its own. All the experimental facts find their
place in this description, unencumbered with any hypothesis save that of
the existence of passing thoughts or states of mind.
[6]"
He concludes his interesting chapter on the
soul with the words: "And in this book the provisional solution which we
have reached must be the final word":
"The thoughts themselves are the thinkers."
And this is an echo of the very words of the
Buddha from 2500 years ago in the valley of the Ganges.
Buddhism, teaching a psychology without a
psyche, resolves the living being into mind and matter (nāma-rūpa)
which are in a state of constant flux.
In the ancient days the Indian sages too
believed in an indivisible atom which they called Paramānu.
According to the ancient belief 36 Paramānus constitute one Anu;
36 Anus, one Tajjāri; 36 Tajjāris, one
Ratharenu. The minute particles of dust seen dancing in the sunbeam
are called Ratharenus. One Paramānu is, therefore, 1/46,656th
part of a Ratharenu. With His supernormal vision the Buddha
analysed the Paramānu and declared that the Paramānu
consists of interrelated forces known as Paramatthas or essentials
of matter. These Paramatthas are Pathavi, Āpo, Tejo, and
Vāyo.
Pathavi.
means the element of extension, the substratum of matter. Without it
objects cannot occupy space. The qualities of hardness and softness which
are relative are two conditions of this same element.
Āpo is
the element of cohesion. Unlike pathavi it is intangible. It is
this element which makes the scattered atoms of matter cohere and gives us
the idea of body. When solid bodies are melted, this element becomes more
prominent in the resulting fluid. This element is found even in
minute particles when solid bodies are reduced to powder. The element of
extension and cohesion are so closely interrelated that when cohesion
ceases extension disappears.
Tejo is
the element of heat. Cold is also a form of tejo. Both heat and
cold are included in tejo because they possess the power of
maturing bodies or, in other words, it is the vitalising energy.
Preservation and decay are due to this element. Unlike the other three
essentials of matter this element, also called utu, has the power
to regenerate by itself.
Vāyo is
the element of motion. Movements are caused by this element. Motion is
regarded as the force or the generator of heat.
"Motion and heat in the material realm
correspond respectively to consciousness and Kamma in the mental."
These four are the fundamental units of matter
and are invariably combined with the four derivatives -- namely, colour
(vanna), odour (gandha) taste (rasa), and nutritive
essence (ojā).
The four elements and the derivatives are
inseparable and interrelated, but one element may preponderate over
another, as for instance, the element of extension preponderates in earth;
cohesion, in water; heat, in fire; and motion, in air.
Thus, matter consists of forces and qualities
which are in a state of constant flux. According to Buddhism matter
endures only for 17 thought moments.
[7]
Mind, the more important part in the complex
machinery of man, consists of fifty-two mental states. Feeling or
sensation (vedanā) is one, perception (saññā) is another.
The remaining fifty are collectively called volitional activities (samkhārā),
a rendering which does not exactly convey the meaning of the Pāli
term. Of them volition or cetanā is the most important factor. All
these psychic states arise in a consciousness (Viññāna).
According to Buddhist philosophy there is no
moment when one does not experience a particular kind of consciousness,
hanging on to some object whether physical or mental. The time limit of
such a consciousness is termed one thought-moment. Each thought-moment is
followed by another. Thus the succession of mental states contains a time
element. The rapidity of the succession of such thought-moments is hardly
conceivable.
Each unit of consciousness consists of three
instants (khana). They are arising or genesis (uppāda),
static or development (thiti) and cessation or dissolution (bhanga).
Immediately after the cessation stage of a
thought-moment there occurs the genesis stage of the subsequent
thought-moment. Each momentary consciousness of this ever-changing life
process, on passing away, transmits its whole energy, all the indelibly
recorded impressions, to its successor. Every fresh consciousness consists
of the potentialities of its predecessors together with something more.
There is therefore a continuous flow of consciousness like a stream
without any interruption. The subsequent thought-moment is neither
absolutely the same as its predecessor since its composition is not
identical -- nor entirely different -- being the same stream of life.
There is no identical being, but there is an identity in process.
It must not be understood that consciousness is
in bits joined together like a train or a chain. On the contrary, "it
constantly flows on like a river receiving from the tributary streams of
sense constant accretions to its flood, and ever dispensing to the world
around it the thought-stuff it has gathered by the way.[8]
It has birth for its source and death for its mouth.
Here occurs a juxtaposition of fleeting states
of consciousness but not a superposition of such states, as some appear to
believe. No state once gone ever recurs -- none absolutely identical with
what goes before. These states constantly change, not remaining the same
for two consecutive moments. Worldlings, enmeshed in the web of illusion,
mistake this apparent continuity to be something eternal and go to the
extent of introducing an unchanging soul (the supposed doer and observer
of all actions) into this ever-changing consciousness.
The four kinds of psychic phenomena, combined
with the physical phenomena, form the five aggregates (pañcak-khanda),
the complex-compound termed a living being.
One's individuality is the combination of these
five aggregates.
We see a vast expanse of water in the sea, but
the water of the ocean consists of countless drops. An infinite number of
particles of sand constitutes the sea-beach, but it appears as one long
sheet. Waves arise and dash against the shore, but, strictly speaking, no
single wave comes from the deep blue sea to lose its identity on the
shore. In the cinematograph we see a moving scene, but to represent that
motion a series of momentary pictures must appear on the screen.
One cannot say that the perfume of a flower
depends on the petal or on the pistil or on the colour, for the perfume is
in the flower.
In the same way one's individuality is the
combination of all the five aggregates.
The whole process of these psycho-physical
phenomena which are constantly becoming and passing away, is at times
called, in conventional terms, the self or attā by the Buddha; but
it is a process, and not an identity that is thus termed.
Buddhism does not totally deny the existence of
a personality in an empirical sense. It denies, in an ultimate sense (paramattha
saccena), an identical being or a permanent entity, but it does not
deny a continuity in process. The Buddhist philosophical term for an
individual is santati, that is, a flux or continuity. This
uninterrupted flux or continuity of psycho-physical phenomena, conditioned
by Kamma, having no perceptible source in the beginningless past nor any
end to its continuation in the future, except by the Noble Eightfold Path,
is the Buddhist substitute for the permanent ego or eternal soul in other
religious systems.
How is rebirth possible without a soul to be
reborn?
Birth, according to Buddhism, is the arising of
the khandas, the aggregates or groups (khandhānam pātubhāvo).
Just as the arising of a physical state is
conditioned by a preceding state as its cause, so the appearance of these
psycho-physical phenomena is conditioned by causes anterior to its birth.
The present process of becoming is the result of the craving for becoming
in the previous birth, and the present instinctive craving conditions life
in a future birth.
As the process of one life-span is possible
without a permanent entity passing from one thought-moment to another, so
a series of life-processes is possible without anything to transmigrate
from one existence to another.
The Buddhist doctrine of rebirth should be
differentiated from the theory of reincarnation which implies the
transmigration of a soul and its invariable material rebirth.
In the Milinda Pañha and Visuddhi
Magga the Venerable Nāgasena and Buddhaghosa have employed several
similes to illustrate the truth that nothing transmigrates from one life
to another.
The simile of the flame is very striking. Life
is compared to a flame. Rebirth is the transmitting of this flame from one
group to another. The flame of life is continuous although there is an
apparent break at so-called death.
King Milinda questions:
"Venerable Nāgasena, does rebirth take place
without anything transmigrating?
"Yes, O King. rebirth takes place without
anything transmigrating.
"Give
me an illustration, Venerable Sir.
"Suppose, O King, a man were to light a light
from light pray, would the one light have passed over to the other light?"
"Nay, indeed, Venerable Sir,
"In exactly the same way, O King, does rebirth
take place without anything transmigrating.
"Give me another illustration.
"Do you remember, O King, having learnt, when
you were a boy, some verse or other from your teacher of poetry?
"Yes, Venerable Sir.
"Pray, O King, did the verse pass over to you
from your teacher?
"Nay, indeed, Venerable Sir.
"In exactly the same way, O King, does rebirth
take place without anything transmigrating."
Again King Milinda questions:
"Venerable Nāgasena, what is it that is born
into the next existence?
"O King, it is mind and body that is born into
the next existence.
"It is this same mind and body that is born
into the next existence?
"O King, it is not this same mind and body that
is born into the next existence, but with this mind and body, O
King, one does a deed -- it may be good, or it may be evil -- and by
reason of this deed another mind and body is born into the next existence.
"Venerable Sir, if it is not this mind
and body that is born into the next existence, is one not freed from one's
evil deeds?
"If one were not born into another
existence, one would be freed from one's evil deeds but, O King, inasmuch
as one is born into another existence, therefore is one not freed from
one's evil deeds.
"Give me an illustration.
"O King, it is as if a man were to take away
another man's mangoes, and the owner of the mangoes were to seize him, and
show him to the king and say --'Sire, this man hath taken away my
mangoes'; and the other were to say, 'Sire, I did not take away his
mangoes. The mangoes which this man planted were different from those
which I took away. I am not liable to punishment.' Pray, O King, would the
man be liable to punishment?
"Assuredly, Venerable, Sir, he would be liable
to punishment.
"For what reason?
"Because, in spite of what he might say, he
would be liable to punishment for the reason that the last mangoes were
derived from the first mangoes.
"In exactly, the same way, O King, with this
mind and body one does a deed -- it may be good, or it may be bad --and by
reason of this deed another mind and body is born into the next existence.
Therefore is one not freed from one's evil deeds.
[9]"
The Venerable Buddhaghosa elucidates
this intricate point by citing the similes of echo, light, impression of a
seal, and reflection in a mirror.
A modern writer illustrates this process by a
series of billiard balls in close contact.
"If, for instance, another ball is rolled
against the last stationary ball, the moving ball will stop dead, and the
foremost stationary ball will move on. The first moving ball does not pass
over, it remains behind, it dies; but it is undeniably the movement of
that ball, its momentum, its Kamma, and not any newly created movement,
which is reborn in the foremost ball.
[10]"
In like manner -- to use conventional terms the
body dies and its Kammic force is reborn in another without anything
transmigrating from this life to the other. The last thought-moment of
this life perishes conditioning another thought-moment in a subsequent
life. The new being is neither absolutely the same -- since it has changed
nor totally different -- being the same stream of Kamma energy. There is
merely a continuity of a particular life-flux; just that and nothing more.
[1]
Religion and Science p. 166.
[2] Religion and
Science, p. 132.
[3] Religion and
Science, p. 166
[4] William James,
Principles of Psychology, p. 351
[5] Watson,
Behaviourism, p. 4.
[6] Principles of
Psychology, p. 215.
[7] It pleases the
commentators to say that the time duration or one thought-moment is even
less than the one millionth part of the time occupied by a flash of
lightning.
[8] See
Compendium of Philosophy -- Introduction, p. 12.
[9] See Warren --
Buddhism in Translations, pp. 234, 235.
[10] Dr. Ananda
Coomarasvami -- Buddha and the Gospel of Buddhism. p.
106.
---o0o---
Top | Contents | 01
| 02
| 03
| 04 | 05
| 06
| 07
| 08
| 09
| 10
| 11
| 12
| 13
| 14
| 15
| 16
| 17
| 18
| 19
| 20
| 21
| 22
| 23 | 24 |
25
| 26
| 27
| 28
| 29
| 30
| 31
| 32
| 33
| 34
| 35
| 36
| 37
| 38
| 39
| 40
| 41
| 42
| 43
| 44
---o0o---
Source : BuddhaSasana website, http://www.budsas.org
---o0o---
Layout: My Hanh - Thien Hung
Update : 01-10-2002
