[lbo-talk] Re: self (was variety etc.)

[kelley at pulpculture.org]

At 10:45 AM 3/13/2004, Jon Johanning wrote:
>It's interesting to observe how, whenever a subject related to Buddhism 
>comes up on this list, members who are ordinarily very well informed about 
>a wide variety of subjects feel entitled to pop off with no background 
>knowledge whatsoever.
>
>The first thing any even slightly informed student of the subject learns 
>is that the term "self" in "no-self" refers primarily to the "atman" in 
>traditional Indian thought. As the Encyclopedia Britannica says:
>
>"one of the most basic concepts in Hindu philosophy, describing that 
>eternal core of the personality that survives after death and that 
>transmigrates to a new life or is released from the bonds of existence. 
>While in the early Vedic texts it occurred mostly as a reflexive pronoun 
>(oneself), in the later Upanishads it comes more and more to the fore as a 
>philosophic topic: atman is that which makes the other organs and 
>faculties function and for which indeed they function; atman underlies all 
>the activities of a person, as Brahman (the absolute) underlies the 
>workings of the universe; to know it brings bliss; it is part of the 
>universal Brahman, with which it can commune or even fuse."
>
>This is what the Buddha denied existence to (except that he didn't quite, 
>but let's not get into too subtle matters here). I doubt that very many 
>contemporary Western folks would maintain that this atman exists, either, 
>so in fact you are all agreeing with the Buddha on this point.

heh. I'm not a big student of Buddhism, but from what little I've read, it 
was pretty clear to me that anyone railing against "no self" didn't 
understand the concept.

Kelley