AlexBrains92,
The Buddha often used different terms to refer to the same thing, also names of brahmanical supernatural beings. Why using Mara instead of desire, or death, in some occasions? Same could go for gandhabba and sperm.
Anyway I repeat: if gandhabba is not sperm, then the Buddha forgot sperm as a condition for pregnancy.
Indeed, but referring to deities associated with guiding beings to be born is a bit odd if he wanted to refer to sperm. My reading is that sperm isn’t left out. It’s implied by the union. I doubt the Buddha had in mind “pulling out”.
In addition to treating rebirth from the perspective of the causes
that affect the quality of the next life, the early Buddhist analysis also takes up the causes for actual conception. These are treated in the Assalāyana-sutta, a discourse that records how a Brahmin at- tempted to challenge the Buddha on the issue of caste superiority. At the end of a discussion in which the Buddha made it clear that the Brahminical belief in caste superiority is groundless, the conditions required for rebirth are listed: "The descent into the womb takes place through the junction of these three [conditions]: there is a union of mother and father, the mother is in season and the gandhabba is present."
The point of bringing up these three conditions in the Assalāyana- sutta's discussion is that it cannot be said to which caste the being belongs that is about to be born. This then forms another argument against Brahminical caste presumptions. Thus the discourse continues: "Sirs, do you know for sure if that gandhabba is [a member of the] warrior [caste], or the Brahmin [caste], or the merchant [caste], or the worker [caste]?"
What makes this passage particularly intriguing is its use of the term gandhabba. The Buddhist conception of a gandhabba appears to have its roots in the Vedic gandharva, which had the particular function of transmitting things from one world to another. Should we then understand the gandhabba in the Assalāyana-sutta to be similar to Yama in the Devadūta-sutta, in the sense that while Yama presides over rebirth in hell, the gandhabba presides over human conception? Yet, according to the commentary to the Assalāyana-sutta, the gandhabba rather stands for the being to be reborn. In fact, the Vedic gandharva as a 'god of transfer' was at times identified with what was under his custody. This sense would seem to be more appropriate to the present context, since the inquiry after the caste of the gandhabba would be meaningful only if it refers to the being to be reborn, not to a god that presides over conception. Thus, though the Vedic concept of a 'god of transfer' helps to explain how the gandhabba would have come to be associated with the transition from one life to another, in its Buddhist usage the term seems to have lost this connotation and appears to stand merely for the being about to be reborn.
https://www.buddhismuskunde.uni-hamburg ... dhabba.pdf
Do you know how there is the descent of an embryo?’
“‘Yes, master, we know how there is the descent of an embryo. There is the case where the mother & father have come together, the mother is fertile, and a gandhabba [the being about to be reborn] is standing present. The coming together of these three is the descent of the embryo.’
“‘But do you know for sure whether the gandhabba is a noble warrior, a brahman, a merchant, or a worker?’
“‘No, master.’
“‘That being the case, do you know who you are?’
“‘That being the case, master, we don’t know who we are.’
https://www.dhammatalks.org/suttas/MN/MN93.html
Personally I’m convinced that it refers to “being about to be born”. That makes for a better reading than sperm, which wouldn’t make much sense when reading this:
“But do you know for sure whether the gandhabba is a noble warrior, a brahman, a merchant, or a worker?’“
Metta
