Anattā (no self)

[pseudonymus]

Originally Posted by ketzer

This is a concept I often think I understand. However, when I do I can't help but wonder who or what is doing the understanding.

How do you understand (or not understand) the buddhist concept of "anatta" (no-self)?
How do you buddhists see it misconstrued by non buddhists?
And finally, for those who do believe they understand this concept, who is doing the understanding?

It helps if you place the conception of "Anatta/Anatma" in context to place and time.

The place and time was ancient India. During that ancient time, Brahmanism was the dominant religion. At this time, the Brahmins had the belief or doctrine of something called the "Atman."

Back then, the "Atman" was taught to be an homunculus that lives inside of your body. This "Atman" was said to be immortal and incorruptable. At physical death, your "Atman" would leave your body, and proceed to reincarnate into a new body. This Atma/Atman was believed to be your "true self," the immortal you.

Back then the Buddha had contentions with the doctrine of the Atman, on the account that it defies the concept of Anicca [Impermanence]. The Buddha believed that (1) All things real must be observable and verifiable, (2) all things real change, (3) the Atman cannot be observed or verified, (4) the Atman is eternal and incorrputable [without change], therefore: the Atman is not real.

So, back then, the early proto-Buddhist philosophers [Shramana] rejected the Brahminical concept of an Atma/Atman, and they called their doctrine "An-Atta" which is the Pali version of the Sanskrit "An-Atma," which literally means "No-Me," or "Without-I."

It's funny, because in our culture [Khmer-Thai], our language is divided into registers, and the monks speak the sacerdotal register. And so, whenever the monks speak, and refer to themselves, they use the word "Atma," because it means "me/I." It's funny in an ironic way.

To compansate for the lack of a soul [atman] that reincarnated, the proto-Buddhists of those ancient times came up with the dhamma of citta-santana. Citta-Santana [pronounced as Chitta-Santana] roughly means "Mindstream," or Psyche-Spectrum. Chitta means "Psyche/Mind/Unconscious-Mind/Heart-mind" and Santana means "Continuum/Spectrum/Continuous-Flow/Coherence/Continuity."

Cittasanatana can be pictured as a vine that flows and moves up a tree, ever changing and twisting. That vine is your Psyche, your Heart-Mind, your Unconscious-Mind. That vine grows flowers. Each flower is an incarnated mortal self/persona. Those flowers bud, bloom, and die, and their suchness, persona, personality, "me-ness," self-identity, ego-quality, wilts or fades into nothing.

Those flowers are fleeting and will fade away into nothing. Thus: anatta, meaning the self or the "you," you feel yourself to be as a person, or human being, is temporary and is an amalgamation of fleeting stuff like experience, memory, views, opinions, blood, flesh, bones, hair. All that will fades into nothing. In the same way that the you that you feel yourself to be in a dream, while you dream at night, will fade into nothing when you wake up in the morning. Your dream you's "selfness" is not real, is not permanant, and is not incorruptable. The reality behind that dream you is the unconscious mind which is the thing having that dream. Your unconscious mind is that which produces countless dream selves at night, just like the analogous vine ever flows and grows, producing countless flowers that bud, unfold, and wilt away.

Over the centuries, various sects of Buddhism will add their own twist and understanding to the dhamma of anatta. But historically, the concept of anatta developed as an antagonistic doctrine which challenged ancient Brahminical beliefs and teachings.

Interestingly, Atma is spelt as ATM, and looks similar to ADM which is how Adama [Adam] is spelt in Hebrew. The Atma/Atman reminds me of Adam Kadmon sometimes, of the Kabbalah.

[Rain95]

Originally Posted by pseudonymus

It helps if you place the conception of "Anatta/Anatma" in context to place and time.

Great post. I tried to refer to the same thing when I posted that Buddhism was rejecting Hinduism's "soul" doctrine but you explained it much better and in more depth.

The way I see it is this: To become enlightened one has to know and observe what is present, what is here now. One has to be aware of what is happening to transcend it. It's really not a cause and effect, a two step process, because the seeing is the transcendence, They occur simultaneously.

To me all these persons who have found this path, Mooji, Tolle, Krisnamurti, Watts, Merton, Buddha, Jesus..... They have become associated with religions over time to various degrees, and of course we can't know to what degree they were or are "enlightened" but one finds hints in their writing and from comparing what they have said to what we experience in our own spiritual pursuits towards liberation.

Seeking a new way to be, a new consciousness, the path of peace and love, is a creative and experimental journey. We have to see, we have to walk it, and discover the way for ourselves, to fundamentally charge what we are and what we experience.

These liberated teachers are not really concerned with belief or religion or dogma or conceptual philosophies. They are about changing what we are moment to moment. To be awake and liberated and completely new and free here and now. To live with zero judgement of others as far as preconceived assumptions not based on what is present in the moment.

So this is the thrust of what was said or taught or presented in real time to those who lived with them, to those who were present in their orbit. Over time, it becomes belief and religion and all of that. Ideas to cling to and argue about. The mind is an thought maker, reactionary and all of that to what is said or heard or read, but all of this is transcended in liberation. One is free of it all to be here now unconditioned and at peace within and without.

One is rooted and firmly established in awareness and understanding, not in ideas, beliefs, or dogma. I feel like I am dancing around the subject at hand but Buddha, if we was enlightened, was not so much denying a self, with formulating some grand philosophy, no, he was trying to tell others to find out for themselves what they were by seeing, observing, becoming aware, questioning, moment to moment what one was creating themselves to be by what we associate and identify with, so to stop thinking and concluding and making now about the conceptual, the mental, take the attention off of mind and thought, be free of it...

I am not a soul, as a soul is an idea, a concept, and I am a fluid and living thing awake and aware now. I am not what I perceive as I am that which is the seer , not the seen. Anything I perceive is not what I am. All the seen is content, and I can be free of all content, so all that remains is what I am.

[pseudonymus]

Originally Posted by Rain95

I feel like I am dancing around the subject at hand but Buddha, if we was enlightened, was not so much denying a self, with formulating some grand philosophy, no, he was trying to tell others to find out for themselves what they were by seeing, observing, becoming aware, questioning, moment to moment what one was creating themselves to be by what we associate and identify with, so to stop thinking and concluding and making now about the conceptual, the mental, take the attention off of mind and thought, be free of it...

I am not a soul, as a soul is an idea, a concept, and I am a fluid and living thing awake and aware now. I am not what I perceive as I am that which is the seer , not the seen. Anything I perceive is not what I am. All the seen is content, and I can be free of all content, so all that remains is what I am.

Beautiful. We think alike! I honestly agree with everything you said up there.

[Gem]

Originally Posted by Rain95

...Buddha, if we was enlightened, was not so much denying a self,

Well, he didn't say you don't exist, but no-self has its own philosophical implications and in the practical sense, you can explore all the subtleties of the body and mind without finding anything that is me, my, mine or I. furthermore, those phenomena have no inherent identity.

with formulating some grand philosophy, no, he was trying to tell others to find out for themselves what they were by seeing, observing, becoming aware, questioning, moment to moment what one was creating themselves to be by what we associate and identify with, so to stop thinking and concluding and making now about the conceptual, the mental, take the attention off of mind and thought, be free of it...

But philosophical discourse is part and parcel of Buddhism, but one that is explored subjectively rather than intellectually.

I am not a soul, as a soul is an idea, a concept, and I am a fluid and living thing awake and aware now. I am not what I perceive as I am that which is the seer , not the seen. Anything I perceive is not what I am. All the seen is content, and I can be free of all content, so all that remains is what I am.

[sky]

Originally Posted by Rain95

Great post. I tried to refer to the same thing when I posted that Buddhism was rejecting Hinduism's "soul" doctrine but you explained it much better and in more depth.

The way I see it is this: To become enlightened one has to know and observe what is present, what is here now. One has to be aware of what is happening to transcend it. It's really not a cause and effect, a two step process, because the seeing is the transcendence, They occur simultaneously.

To me all these persons who have found this path, Mooji, Tolle, Krisnamurti, Watts, Merton, Buddha, Jesus..... They have become associated with religions over time to various degrees, and of course we can't know to what degree they were or are "enlightened" but one finds hints in their writing and from comparing what they have said to what we experience in our own spiritual pursuits towards liberation.

Seeking a new way to be, a new consciousness, the path of peace and love, is a creative and experimental journey. We have to see, we have to walk it, and discover the way for ourselves, to fundamentally charge what we are and what we experience.

These liberated teachers are not really concerned with belief or religion or dogma or conceptual philosophies. They are about changing what we are moment to moment. To be awake and liberated and completely new and free here and now. To live with zero judgement of others as far as preconceived assumptions not based on what is present in the moment.

So this is the thrust of what was said or taught or presented in real time to those who lived with them, to those who were present in their orbit. Over time, it becomes belief and religion and all of that. Ideas to cling to and argue about. The mind is an thought maker, reactionary and all of that to what is said or heard or read, but all of this is transcended in liberation. One is free of it all to be here now unconditioned and at peace within and without.

One is rooted and firmly established in awareness and understanding, not in ideas, beliefs, or dogma. I feel like I am dancing around the subject at hand but Buddha, if we was enlightened, was not so much denying a self, with formulating some grand philosophy, no, he was trying to tell others to find out for themselves what they were by seeing, observing, becoming aware, questioning, moment to moment what one was creating themselves to be by what we associate and identify with, so to stop thinking and concluding and making now about the conceptual, the mental, take the attention off of mind and thought, be free of it...

I am not a soul, as a soul is an idea, a concept, and I am a fluid and living thing awake and aware now. I am not what I perceive as I am that which is the seer , not the seen. Anything I perceive is not what I am. All the seen is content, and I can be free of all content, so all that remains is what I am.

' I tried to refer to the same thing when I posted that Buddhism was rejecting Hinduism's "soul" doctrine '




Buddha was rejecting Brahminism not Hinduism which as the Religion that we know today came way after Buddhism.

[Rain95]

Originally Posted by sky123

Buddha was rejecting Brahmanism not Hinduism which as the Religion that we know today came way after Buddhism.

Yes true and also Buddha was not rejecting anything external to himself, he could only reject that which was present within himself and since he was conditioned by Brahmanism as he grew up from a child to an adult, it existed there within his brain, memory and mind. It was content his mind would throw up upon what was, the empty and unconditioned now, an added content, an overlay or filter that colored and created experience and his sense of self.

Reject is probably not the best word to use here because the one who would "reject" is also a product of mind. Buddha, if in an enlightened state, would be aware of that which would "reject" and be free of it or perhaps better said, he was aware of himself, unconditioned and free of mind and so being aware of the content and what actually existed as far as experience and awareness free of content, the mind content faded from experience in the light of this seeing or truth. Seeing is perhaps a better word than rejecting.

One walks under a blue sky across green grass and that which is to be rejected dies under the gaze of awareness. It is unsubstantial, its power and life comes from us and nowhere else. We are the energy that powers it, that turns it on, when we withdrawal from it, it no longer has a identity forming and experiential affecting reality except in those who feed it with their attention and energy, those who identify with it as from and of them.

[sky]

Originally Posted by Rain95

Yes true and also Buddha was not rejecting anything external to himself, he could only reject that which was present within himself and since he was conditioned by Brahmanism as he grew up from a child to an adult, it existed there within his brain, memory and mind. It was content his mind would throw up upon what was, the empty and unconditioned now, an added content, an overlay or filter that colored and created experience and his sense of self.

Reject is probably not the best word to use here because the one who would "reject" is also a product of mind. Buddha, if in an enlightened state, would be aware of that which would "reject" and be free of it or perhaps better said, he was aware of himself, unconditioned and free of mind and so being aware of the content and what actually existed as far as experience and awareness free of content, the mind content faded from experience in the light of this seeing or truth. Seeing is perhaps a better word than rejecting.

One walks under a blue sky across green grass and that which is to be rejected dies under the gaze of awareness. It is unsubstantial, its power and life comes from us and nowhere else. We are the energy that powers it, that turns it on, when we withdrawal from it, it no longer has a identity forming and experiential affecting reality except in those who feed it with their attention and energy, those who identify with it as from and of them.

Why do you think Buddha competed against Hinduism? ( Which didn't exist )
I can't see any ' Competition ' in his Teachings rather an obvious different way of looking at things.

Your Post below....



'As far as Buddhism's "Anatta" the simple explanation is Buddhism was competing with Hinduism which relies heavily on the "soul" concept and so Buddhism had to deny such a thing to differentiate itself from Hinduism. '

Originally Posted by pseudonymus

To compansate for the lack of a soul [atman] that reincarnated, the proto-Buddhists of those ancient times came up with the dhamma of citta-santana. Citta-Santana [pronounced as Chitta-Santana] roughly means "Mindstream," or Psyche-Spectrum. Chitta means "Psyche/Mind/Unconscious-Mind/Heart-mind" and Santana means "Continuum/Spectrum/Continuous-Flow/Coherence/Continuity."

Cittasanatana can be pictured as a vine that flows and moves up a tree, ever changing and twisting. That vine is your Psyche, your Heart-Mind, your Unconscious-Mind. That vine grows flowers. Each flower is an incarnated mortal self/persona. Those flowers bud, bloom, and die, and their suchness, persona, personality, "me-ness," self-identity, ego-quality, wilts or fades into nothing.

Those flowers are fleeting and will fade away into nothing. Thus: anatta, meaning the self or the "you," you feel yourself to be as a person, or human being, is temporary and is an amalgamation of fleeting stuff like experience, memory, views, opinions, blood, flesh, bones, hair. All that will fades into nothing. In the same way that the you that you feel yourself to be in a dream, while you dream at night, will fade into nothing when you wake up in the morning. Your dream you's "selfness" is not real, is not permanant, and is not incorruptable. The reality behind that dream you is the unconscious mind which is the thing having that dream. Your unconscious mind is that which produces countless dream selves at night, just like the analogous vine ever flows and grows, producing countless flowers that bud, unfold, and wilt away.

I had not heard of this Cittasanatana concept before. This description matches pretty well with the way I have come to conceptualize things. Of course all conceptualizations are just that, more or less shadows of things, but this idea of the vine, dreams, etc. is as good a conceptualization as I have seen.

Thanks, I will have to look into this more some time.

[pseudonymus]

Originally Posted by ketzer

I had not heard of this Cittasanatana concept before. This description matches pretty well with the way I have come to conceptualize things. Of course all conceptualizations are just that, more or less shadows of things, but this idea of the vine, dreams, etc. is as good a conceptualization as I have seen.

Thanks, I will have to look into this more some time.

You're welcome.

The essential concept of the cittasantana, being a Continuity of Psyche, correlates very well with how the olden Greeks and Romans viewed the "spirit" of a person. The word psyche back then to the Greeks and Romans meant something different than what it has come to mean today. An example of how they used the word:

[Rain95]

Ultimately, the only place to look for it is in an awareness of where our attention is now and the corresponding state of consciousness this creates and the simultaneous realization that other states of being are possible though this awareness of ourselves. I create what I am and the corresponding experience through what I am paying attention to or not paying attention to. Through what I am aware of or not aware of. Enlightenment is a current choice of liberation of consciousness as opposed to bondage to, and identification with, mind.

Why do you think Buddha competed against Hinduism?

Your Post below....

'As far as Buddhism's "Anatta" the simple explanation is....

Buddha and Buddhism are two different things. One is an individual that lived and died a long time ago, the other a world religion and complex philosophy and belief system that exists today.

Post #41 above gives a great explanation of the subject of Anatta and early religions.