the great rebirth debate

[DNS]

I still struggle to understand how rebirth is compatible with anatta. Rebirth implies something that continues on, or something that reappears. But the aggregates are described as being transient, conditional and not-self, so there is nothing in them to continue or reappear.

A lot of Buddhists struggle with this. We can see numerous great debates here and at our sister site DW-Mahayana and other discussion forums, with the same issues of how can there be rebirth when there is no soul, no permanent consciousness, no self or anything else?

There are a number of similes and analogies that have been presented by various people, including:

1. Neuroses are reborn (although that still sounds like something permanent or at least semi-permanent)
2. Karmic energies
3. A candle burning and lighting a new candle (the flame continuing, not the candle form)
4. Signal transfer similar to changing the channel on your tv with a remote control.
5. The Ship Theseus

But some have even found the above difficult to accept, because if it's a mere transfer with it not being the same person, then why did the Buddha clearly talk about past lives in great detail, "here I was this person, from this family, with this name, this manner of culture, etc ..."

Some have interpreted it to be an impermanent-self, but this appears to be at odds with orthodox Theravada and Mahayana doctrine.

[cappuccino]

then why did the Buddha clearly talk about past lives in great detail, "here I was this person, from this family, with this name, this manner of culture, etc …"

the soul is undeclared, the soul may exist

[Aloka]

I would like to see new explanations about rebirth rather than bringing to our attention english translations of the same Suttas (MN 36, SN 22.79, etc.) over and over. It only makes me more and more agnostic about the topic.

Hi mjaviem,

I suggest you read the following excerpt from an article by Ajahn Amaro, abbot of Amaravati Monastery UK: with the title "Unshakeable Well-Being: Is the Buddhist Concept of Enlightenment a Meaningful Possibility in the Current Age"...

https://amaravati.org/a-dhamma-article- ... ell-being/

alternative link:https://link.springer.com/article/10.10 ... 19-01179-7

Near the beginning of the article he says:

In Buddhist tradition, and in a more mythological expression, enlightenment is also called “the ending of the cycle of birth and death”—this makes reference to rebirth as well as to the diminishing and ending of rebirth. I think it’s helpful here to say that one of the things that attracted me and many other people towards the Buddha’s teachings is its non-dogmatic nature. I am quite aware that many people do not like the concepts of past lives, future lives, and rebirth. That sort of terminology may send shudders through the system and that’s fair enough. I feel that even though the texts talk in terms like “ending the cycles of birth and death,” it is completely valid to think of that in terms of “psychological birth and death.”

What do I mean by that phrase? For example, you might be born into your current book project or your new experimental design. That is a birth. The mind takes hold of a particular venture, a possession, an identity, a personal relationship, or a social role. We might say that we are born into the role of being a Dhamma teacher or into the role of being a professor, born into founding a particular project, and with that birth is also a delight. The delight comes from the sense that everything is going well, there is the aspiration that beautiful and useful things might come forth from it. But there is also the death element; perhaps things do not work so well, or you do not get funded the next time, or you present your thesis and you get slammed by your professors. There is a bitterness that comes when you have invested in something and then have to see your aspirations die. That is birth and death. Buddhist language does not just refer to physical birth and death, it also refers to psychological birth and death.

[Sam Vara]

I still struggle to understand how rebirth is compatible with anatta. Rebirth implies something that continues on, or something that reappears. But the aggregates are described as being transient, conditional and not-self, so there is nothing in them to continue or reappear.

Yes, see my point here:

viewtopic.php?p=626426#p626426

DNS's point about the Ship of Theseus might be helpful here. What is reborn is not exactly the same as what has died; but there is enough of it remaining to allow those with the Divine Eye to see how it arises from the last set of conditions, and therefore meaningfully refer to it by the same noun or pronoun as before.

[Spiny Norman]

I still struggle to understand how rebirth is compatible with anatta. Rebirth implies something that continues on, or something that reappears. But the aggregates are described as being transient, conditional and not-self, so there is nothing in them to continue or reappear.

A lot of Buddhists struggle with this. We can see numerous great debates here and at our sister site DW-Mahayana and other discussion forums, with the same issues of how can there be rebirth when there is no soul, no permanent consciousness, no self or anything else?

There are a number of similes and analogies that have been presented by various people, including:

1. Neuroses are reborn (although that still sounds like something permanent or at least semi-permanent)
2. Karmic energies
3. A candle burning and lighting a new candle (the flame continuing, not the candle form)
4. Signal transfer similar to changing the channel on your tv with a remote control.
5. The Ship Theseus

But some have even found the above difficult to accept, because if it's a mere transfer with it not being the same person, then why did the Buddha clearly talk about past lives in great detail, "here I was this person, from this family, with this name, this manner of culture, etc ..."

Some have interpreted it to be an impermanent-self, but this appears to be at odds with orthodox Theravada and Mahayana doctrine.

Yes, I've come across most of these explanations, but haven't found them very satisfying. The later introduction of "storehouse consciousness" looks to me like an attempt to square the circle.

[Spiny Norman]

I still struggle to understand how rebirth is compatible with anatta. Rebirth implies something that continues on, or something that reappears. But the aggregates are described as being transient, conditional and not-self, so there is nothing in them to continue or reappear.

I must say I’ve never understood this argument. To me rebirth and anatta go easily together.

I sort of get how rebirth would work with an atta or "soul", or some kind of lasting essence. But with anatta it's like there's nothing to be reborn. Just one set of transient aggregates ceasing, and another set of transient aggregates arising, or something.

[Spiny Norman]

I still struggle to understand how rebirth is compatible with anatta. Rebirth implies something that continues on, or something that reappears. But the aggregates are described as being transient, conditional and not-self, so there is nothing in them to continue or reappear.

I like to think of death as merely a quick dip into the deepest and most radical sleep there is... on awakening...it's just a continuation... like we do every night.

Most Buddhist's have no problem with an anatta as a day to day principle and happily accept it going to sleep and waking up.

All death is, is a change of clothes and habitat.

Imagine being put under to undergo radical plastic surgery. You wake up... you're a different person, they've moved you to a different hospital and you've won the lottery (or been made bankrupt)...
And to top it all, the anaesthetic was so strong you've lost your memory.

People can accept anatta after a good nights sleep... they know that no self can be found... why should death (sleep) and rebirth (waking up in the morning) be any different?

The plastic surgery / amnesia scenario is interesting, given that one's personal identity is highly dependent on appearance and memory.
But what is being "reborn" in this scenario?

[BrokenBones]

I still struggle to understand how rebirth is compatible with anatta...

I like to think of death as merely a quick dip into the....

The plastic surgery / amnesia scenario is interesting, given that one's personal identity is highly dependent on appearance and memory.
But what is being "reborn" in this scenario?

The same thing that is 'reborn' from moment to moment and from one good nights sleep to another... but with a more seismic shift than usual... the mechanics of such an event are going to be a closed book for most of us.

[mikenz66]

Hi Spiny,

I still struggle to understand how rebirth is compatible with anatta. Rebirth implies something that continues on, or something that reappears. But the aggregates are described as being transient, conditional and not-self, so there is nothing in them to continue or reappear.

I must say I’ve never understood this argument. To me rebirth and anatta go easily together.

I sort of get how rebirth would work with an atta or "soul", or some kind of lasting essence. But with anatta it's like there's nothing to be reborn. Just one set of transient aggregates ceasing, and another set of transient aggregates arising, or something.

I have found Patrick Kearney's talks on "life after life", in the context of anatta, helpful. Unfortunately, he switches around the talks on his site: https://patrickkearney.net/ and the nice series of talks given in Sydney a few years ago are no longer there.

Here's a link that does currently work, to a quite old talk: https://www.buddhistelibrary.org/en/dis ... play_media
Those familiar with the not-self sutta can skip forward to about the 50 minute mark.


Mike

[Spiny Norman]

I like to think of death as merely a quick dip into the....

The plastic surgery / amnesia scenario is interesting, given that one's personal identity is highly dependent on appearance and memory.
But what is being "reborn" in this scenario?

The same thing that is 'reborn' from moment to moment and from one good nights sleep to another... but with a more seismic shift than usual... the mechanics of such an event are going to be a closed book for most of us.

But again, what is "reborn" moment to moment, or day to day, when there are only transient, conditional aggregates?

[BrokenBones]

The plastic surgery / amnesia scenario is interesting, given that one's personal identity is highly dependent on appearance and memory.
But what is being "reborn" in this scenario?

The same thing that is 'reborn' from moment to moment and from one good nights sleep to another... but with a more seismic shift than usual... the mechanics of such an event are going to be a closed book for most of us.

But again, what is "reborn" moment to moment, or day to day, when there are only transient, conditional aggregates?

I would say that, that is the wrong question.

Where is the self in moment to moment... day to day?

Would be more in line with the Buddha's teachings... he never offered to show the mechanics of how the world is as it is... only the cause and end of suffering.

[DooDoot]

I have found Patrick Kearney's talks on "life after life", in the context of anatta, helpful. Unfortunately, he switches around the talks on his site: https://patrickkearney.net/ and the nice series of talks given in Sydney a few years ago are no longer there.

sounds heretical

The suttas always say "a being" or "man" or "woman" or "person" undergoes upapajjati

Anatta-rebirth means there is no receiver of kamma; no personal incentive to do good

MN 117 clearly says the rebirth doctrine must side with upadhi (attachment)

[Ceisiwr]

When the greetings and polite conversation were over, he sat down to one side and asked the Buddha, “Sir, how many eons have passed?”

“Brahmin, many eons have passed. It’s not easy to calculate how many eons have passed, how many hundreds or thousands or hundreds of thousands of eons.”

“But sir, can you give a simile?”

“I can,” said the Buddha.

“Consider the Ganges river from where it originates to where it enters the ocean. Between these places it’s not easy to calculate how many grains of sand there are, how many hundreds or thousands or hundreds of thousands of grains of sand. The eons that have passed are more than this. It’s not easy to calculate how many eons have passed, how many hundreds or thousands or hundreds of thousands of eons.

Why is that? Transmigration has no known beginning. No first point is found of sentient beings roaming and transmigrating, hindered by ignorance and fettered by craving. For such a long time you have undergone suffering, agony, and disaster, swelling the cemeteries. This is quite enough for you to become disillusioned, dispassionate, and freed regarding all conditions.”
When he said this, the brahmin said to the Buddha, “Excellent, Master Gotama! Excellent! … From this day forth, may Master Gotama remember me as a lay follower who has gone for refuge for life.”

https://suttacentral.net/sn15.8/en/sujato

[cappuccino]

For such a long time you have undergone suffering, agony, and disaster, swelling the cemeteries.

[Dweller]

Speculation about what exactly is being reborn is similar to questions like what am I and how am I, and such questions about future, which are mentioned among ideas not worthy of attention.

"This is how he attends inappropriately: 'Was I in the past? Was I not in the past? What was I in the past? How was I in the past? Having been what, what was I in the past? Shall I be in the future? Shall I not be in the future? What shall I be in the future? How shall I be in the future? Having been what, what shall I be in the future?' Or else he is inwardly perplexed about the immediate present: 'Am I? Am I not? What am I? How am I? Where has this being come from? Where is it bound?'

"As he attends inappropriately in this way, one of six kinds of view arises in him: The view I have a self arises in him as true & established, or the view I have no self... or the view It is precisely by means of self that I perceive self... or the view It is precisely by means of self that I perceive not-self... or the view It is precisely by means of not-self that I perceive self arises in him as true & established, or else he has a view like this: This very self of mine — the knower that is sensitive here & there to the ripening of good & bad actions — is the self of mine that is constant, everlasting, eternal, not subject to change, and will stay just as it is for eternity. This is called a thicket of views, a wilderness of views, a contortion of views, a writhing of views, a fetter of views. Bound by a fetter of views, the uninstructed run-of-the-mill person is not freed from birth, aging, & death, from sorrow, lamentation, pain, distress, & despair. He is not freed, I tell you, from suffering & stress.

https://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitak ... .than.html