Dear Tenphel



I hope this finds you well and happy.



You end your email with the question "is that right?" In this regard, it is
recorded that the Buddha taught not to say "this is true/the truth/right" or
"this is not true/the truth/right", but just, when we believe something, to
say "I believe this [is true/the truth/right]" or "I don't believe this [is
true/the truth/right]". He is then said to call speaking the latter way
"safeguarding the truth, but it is not yet an awakening to the truth". [M 95
: M ii 171:
http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/mn/mn.095x.than.html#blind%5d



This advice seems to show the Buddha's valuing of personal experience, to
express conditioned arising in everyday life, is encouraging honesty and
seeing and expressing one's views as such [as they really are], rather than
clinging to them as the truth. The latter leads to judgements and absolute
statements which are part of dogmatism. In the past I found it quite easy to
say the Buddha does not teach dogma, but difficult to identify my dogma
about the Buddha's teaching.



I do not accept that "there is no self" is a translation of "anatta". I
think "there is no self" would be translated in Pali as "n'atthi attaa"
which, from my study the Buddha is only quoted as saying, when he is
pointing out that it is an extreme view that he does not teach [and the same
with "atthi attaa"]. I think the main point in the idea of attaa, i.e.
permanence, is the thing the Buddha is wont to dispel. If one believes in an
impermanent self that is dependently arisen, I see no problem in that. It
for this reason I prefer to translate "attaa" as "soul" or "Self" [self with
a capital s]. The "soul" theory of Christianity seems to match reasonably
well the Brahmin's idea of atman, both being religions with a creator god.



"There is no self" seems to be a corruption of an essential teaching of the
Buddha "all dhammas are not soul/Self"[sabbe dhammaa anattaa:
http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/kn/dhp/dhp.20.than.html#dhp-277 ].
"Anattaa" seems to have been taken out of the context of the sentence and
then the natural tendency to go to the other extreme [e.g. opposite to the
one current at the time in Brahmanism] kicks in.



I agree with the idea that the Buddha didn't teach there was "no
self/soul/spirit" nor that there was one, and I see both as extreme views as
you point out.



Kind Regards







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Intelligence




Dhammadarsa [Darsa] Bhikkhu
Buddhist Monk

Mahachulalongkornrajavidyalaya University
Wang Noi
Ayuthaya
Thailand


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From: Pali@yahoogroups.com [mailto:Pali@yahoogroups.com] On Behalf Of
Gabriel Jaeger
Sent: Monday, 3 May 2010 8:23 AM
To: Pali@yahoogroups.com
Subject: Re: [Pali] Re: Translating anatta





Dear Dhamma Friends,

I was wondering if in the pali texts we find also nairatmya as a synonimous
of annatta.
Interesting is that as far as I know nairatmya would mean the "absence of
self" or "selflessness".
I was thinking how this two words were been used in the texts, if would be
some major difference etc.

I ask that because I have the feeling that the Buddha didn't conclude that
there was no "self at all"...I think this would be one of the extremes of
"existence" and "no-existence". He would just negate the conception of self
existent at his time, so annatta.

Is that right?

Warm regards,
tenphel

On Sun, Apr 18, 2010 at 2:11 PM, Nina van Gorkom <vangorko@...
<mailto:vangorko%40xs4all.nl> > wrote:

>
>
> Dear DC,
> Thank you for your contribution. The sutta is in the beginning of
> the Mahaavagga. It is a perfect explanation of anattaa.
> Nina.
> Op 16-apr-2010, om 20:20 heeft dcwijeratna het volgende geschreven:
>
>
> > The definition of anatta is given in the anattalakkhanasutta, the
> > second discourse of the Buddha. See Vinaya Mahavagga, I. B. Horner.
>
> [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
>
>
>

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