The Self

[Acumen]

Does Buddhism maintain that the "self" doesn't exist?

[metis]

Does Buddhism maintain that the "self" doesn't exist?

The dharma of "no self" is so widely misunderstood.  It doesn't mean that one doesn't exist, which would be nihilistic, but that one does not appear to exist as an unchanging entity separate from the rest of our surroundings.

Shalom,
Vern

[Acumen]

Vern,

If one does not appear to exist as an unchanging entity, then what is reborn?

[metis]

Vern,

If one does not appear to exist as an unchanging entity, then what is reborn?

A "stream of consciousness".

[Acumen]

And?  Care to expound what a "stream of consciousness" involves?  Work with me, Vern.

[metis]

And?  Care to expound what a "stream of consciousness" involves?  Work with me, Vern.

All things change and, therefore, one is not reincarnated, as we find in Hindu theology, but are reborn, but not as the same person.  However, there's some evidence to suggest that there may be a "stream of consciousness" that may migrate from one person to another when reborn, but ascertaining it is very difficult since it's a changing entity as well.

Gotta be brief, so I'll be back a bit later this evening.

Shalom,
Vern

[Acumen]

However, there's some evidence to suggest that there may be a "stream of consciousness" that may migrate from one person to another when reborn, but ascertaining it is very difficult since it's a changing entity as well.

Right, there seems to be something inconsistent here.  The term "rebirth" implies an unchanging something that transitions through a recycling of birthing processes.  Couldn't this something be considered "self?"

[metis]

Right, there seems to be something inconsistent here.  The term "rebirth" implies an unchanging something that transitions through a recycling of birthing processes.  Couldn't this something be considered "self?"

No, that's not the way it's pictured.  Remember that, according to dharma, all things change over time.  If that's true, then anyone that dies will not only change in the process of dying, but "they" will also change even afterword.  Even the stream of consciousness changes as well.  Rebirth itself involves change by definition. 

Shalom,
Vern

[sobeit9]

In her usual beautiful laconic fashion that expresses experiential understanding, Simone throws light on the Buddhist conception of re-birth of the self.

"The self is only the shadow which sin and error cast by stopping the light of God, and I take this shadow for a self."   Simone Weil

She refers here to our personality which reconciles the inner contradiction of the plurality of our human condition through imagination.  The task is to become detached from it so that the imagination can be seen for what it is.  We don't do it so this same effect repeats and called re-birth of the same condition but in different form.

This is different from Christian re-birth which refers to a return to (reborn into) a higher state of "isness" of "being" natural for before the fall of man.  The seed of the soul, hidden by our personality, potentially can begin to mature and become a soul.

The problem in Christianity is the same as in Buddhism which is in becoming able to get out of our own way.

[allthegoodnamesweretaken]

I'd love to help ya Vern, but the interpretation I go off of is that we are as much a part of a spiritual ecosystem as we are a material one, and as such that which makes up our core being will be recycled into others in the same way the atoms that make us up are.  I don't really know how to reconcile that with what is being talked about.

all

[metis]

I'd love to help ya Vern, but the interpretation I go off of is that we are as much a part of a spiritual ecosystem as we are a material one, and as such that which makes up our core being will be recycled into others in the same way the atoms that make us up are.  I don't really know how to reconcile that with what is being talked about.

Thanks for the thought, but what I posted last was just a p.c. depiction of dharma, which acumen is aware of.  I'm not Buddhist even though I use the more philosophical teachings (minus the more "religious" teachings such as nirvana, rebirth, bodhissatvas, etc.) of dharma quite often.  My orientation is mostly scientific (retired anthropologist) and I'm non-theistic.

Shalom,
Vern 

[Acumen]

The problem in Christianity is the same as in Buddhism which is in becoming able to get out of our own way.

How is this a problem for buddhism?

[allthegoodnamesweretaken]

The problem in Christianity is the same as in Buddhism which is in becoming able to get out of our own way.

How is this a problem for buddhism?

I would say that it's not necessarily a problem for Buddhism, but it can be a problem for Buddhists.

 

all

[jacknky]

Reincarnation, which I supose is what's being discussed here, is not an issue for me. I suppose there are other beings more enlightened than I who have some personal experience to base their beliefs in reincarnation on. At my level I'm just trying to see this life clearly.