WHAT THE BUDDHA NEVER SAID “There is no self”

Aik TC SG

WHAT THE BUDDHA NEVER SAID “There is no self”

“Nope, never said that, either.”—The Buddha Thanissaro Bhikkhu tricycle

The Buddha was careful to classify questions according to how they should be answered, based on how helpful they were to gaining awakening. Some questions deserved a categorical answer, that is, one that holds true across the board. Some he answered analytically, redefining or refining the terms before answering. Some required counter-questioning, to clarify the issue in the questioner’s mind. But if the question was an obstacle on the path, the Buddha put it aside.

When Vacchagotta the wanderer asked him point-blank whether or not there is a self, the Buddha remained silent, which means that the question has no helpful answer. As he later explained to Ananda, to respond either yes or no to this question would be to side with opposite extremes of wrong view (Samyutta Nikaya 44.10). Some have argued that the Buddha didn’t answer with “no” because Vacchagotta wouldn’t have understood the answer. But there’s another passage where the Buddha advises all the monks to avoid getting involved in questions such as “What am I?” “Do I exist?” “Do I not exist?” because they lead to answers like “I have a self” and “I have no self,” both of which are a “thicket of views, a writhing of views, a contortion of views” that get in the way of awakening (Majjhima Nikaya 2).

So how did we get the idea that the Buddha said that there is no self? The main culprit seems to be the debate culture of ancient India. Religious teachers often held public debates on the hot questions of the day, both to draw adherents and to angle for royal patronage. The Buddha warned his followers not to enter into these debates (Sutta Nipata 4.8), partly because once the sponsor of a debate had set a question, the debaters couldn’t follow the Buddha’s policy of putting useless questions aside.

Later generations of monks forgot the warning and soon found themselves in debates where they had to devise a Buddhist answer to the question of whether there is or isn’t a self. The Kathavatthu, an Abhidhamma text attributed to the time of King Ashoka, contains the earliest extant version of the answer “no.” Two popular literary works, the Buddhacharita and Milinda Panha, both from around the first century CE, place this “no” at the center of the Buddha’s message. Later texts, like the Abhidharmakosha Bhashya, provide analytical answers to the question of whether there is a self, saying that there’s no personal self but that each person has a “dharma-self” composed of five aggregates: material form, feelings, perceptions, mental fabrications, and consciousness. At present we have our own analytical answers to the question, such as the teaching that although we have no separate self, we do have a cosmic self—a teaching, by the way, that the Buddha singled out for special ridicule (MN 22).

“There is no self” is the granddaddy of fake Buddhist quotes. It has survived so long because of its superficial resemblance to the teaching on anatta, or not-self, which was one of the Buddha’s tools for putting an end to clinging. Even though he neither affirmed nor denied the existence of a self, he did talk of the process by which the mind creates many senses of self—what he called “I-making” and “my-making”—as it pursues its desires.

In other words, he focused on the karma of selfing. Because clinging lies at the heart of suffering, and because there’s clinging in each sense of self, he advised using the perception of not-self as a strategy to dismantle that clinging. Whenever you see yourself identifying with anything stressful and inconstant, you remind yourself that it’s not-self: not worth clinging to, not worth calling your self (SN 22.59). This helps you let go of it. When you do this thoroughly enough, it can lead to awakening. In this way, the not-self teaching is an answer—not to the question of whether there’s a self, but to the question that the Buddha said lies at the heart of discernment: “What, when I do it, will lead to my long-term welfare and happiness?” (MN 135). You find true happiness by letting go.

Some ways of selfing, the Buddha and his disciples found, are useful along the path, as when you develop a sense of self that’s heedful and responsible, confident that you can manage the practice (Anguttara Nikaya 4.159). While you’re on the path, you apply the perception of not-self to anything that would pull you astray. Only at the end do you apply that perception to the path itself. As for the goal, it’s possible to develop a sense of clinging around the experience of the deathless, so the Buddha advises that you regard even the deathless as not-self (AN 9.36). But when there’s no more clinging, you have no need for perceptions either of self or not-self. You see no point in answering the question of whether there is or isn’t a self because you’ve found the ultimate happiness.

The belief that there is no self can actually get in the way of awakening. As the Buddha noted, the contemplation of not-self can lead to an experience of nothingness (MN 106). If your purpose in practicing is to disprove the self—perhaps from wanting to escape the responsibilities of having a self—you can easily interpret the experience of nothingness as the proof you’re looking for: a sign you’ve reached the end of the path. Yet the Buddha warned that subtle clinging can persist in that experience. If you think you’ve reached awakening, you won’t look for the clinging. But if you learn to keep looking for clinging, even in the experience of nothingness, you’ll have a chance of finding it. Only when you find it can you then let it go.

So it’s important to remember which questions the not-self teaching was meant to answer and which ones it wasn’t. Getting clear on this point can mean the difference between a false awakening and the real thing.

An Eternal Now SG

robertk:

This is an old post from ven. Dhammanando that i liked
http://www.lioncity.net/buddhism/index. ... 3364&st=60
Citing the relevant suttas is unlikely to be persuasive to those who have fallen for Thanissaro's mystical drivel, for Thanissaro would simply interpret them differently or else would translate them differently so as to make them support his view. A good example of this is the following passage from the Alagaddūpamasutta, which is one of the starkest and most uncompromising assertions of the non-existence of self.... until Thanissaro gets his hands on it:

attani ca attaniye ca saccato thetato anupalabbhamāne
(MN. 22; also cited in the Kathāvatthu's debate on the puggalavāda, Kvu. 68)

And here are some extracts from an old article of mine discussing this phrase...

First I cite seven translations of it:

Dhammanando:
"...since in truth and reality there obtains neither self nor what belongs to self..."

Ñāṇamoli/Bodhi:
"...since a self and what belongs to a self are not apprehended as true and established..."

Thanissaro:
"...where a self or what belongs to self are not pinned down as a truth or reality..."

B.C. Law:
"...But both soul and that which belongs to soul being in truth, and forever, impossible to be known..."

I.B. Horner:
"But if Self and what belongs to Self, although actually existing are incomprehensible..."

Mahāmakut Tipiṭaka:
"...meua attā lae borikhān neuang duai attā bukkhon theu ao mai dai, doey khwām pen khong jing, doey khwām pen khong thae..."

Mahāchulalongkorn Tipiṭaka:
"...meua thang ton lae khong thii neuang kap ton ja yang hen mai dai, doey khwām pen khong jing, doey khwām pen khong thae..."

Then my comments:

Of the seven renderings above, those of Horner and Law are completely off the map, while the remaining five are more or less defensible so far as purely philological considerations go.

There are two key terms in the passage that give rise to disagreement: firstly, the participle "anupalabbhamāne"; secondly, the phrase "saccato thetato". How one conceives the meaning of these will determine how one interprets the passage; and how one interprets the passage will determine how one goes about translating it. The problem, of course, is that every translator's interpretation of the above phrases will be determined - or at least influenced - by his prior assumptions about the Buddha's teaching.

Let's start with anupalabbhamāne. This is the present participle of the passive form of the verb upalabhati, inflected in the locative case. In front of it is placed the negative particle na ('not'), which changes to an- in accordance with the rules of euphonic junction.

Upalabhati means to obtain, get or find. So in the passive voice it would mean to be obtained, gotten or found. With the addition of the negative particle 'na' the meaning would be "not to be found."

Here's one familiar example of the verb, to be found in every Indian logic textbook:

vañjhāya putto na upalabbhati.
"A son of a barren woman is not to be found."

(Or as western philosophers would phrase it, " 'Son of a barren woman' does not obtain."). Elsewhere the same will be predicated of "horns of a hare", "flowers in the sky", etc.

And here arises the first point of controversy among translators and interpreters of this sutta: does the phrase "not to be obtained" mean the same as "not exist"? Ñāṇamoli, Bodhi and myself would answer yes. A mystically-inclined monk like Thanissaro would answer no. Unsurprisingly Thanissaro has chosen a rendering ("not pinned down") that stresses the epistemic or cognitive, and would tend to imply that a self does (or at least might) exist, but one that is too inscrutable to say anything about.

To continue, when the verb na upalabbhati is made into a present participle, the meaning would be "non-obtaining" (or more precisely, a "not-being-obtained-ness"). When this present participle is inflected in the locative case, then various meanings are possible, and here arises the second point of controversy. What function does the locative have in this context? There are three possibilities:

Spatial or situational stipulative: "Where there is a non-obtaining of self..."
Temporal stipulative: "When there is a non-obtaining of self...."
Causative: "Because there is a non-obtaining of self..."

Ñāṇamoli, Bodhi and I of course favour the causative, for the other two would leave a loophole that there might be some time or place where self does obtain. Thanissaro of course favours a reading that will leave his mysticism intact. So here too it's a case of our prior assumptions determining how we translate.

Now for "saccato thetato". Sacca means true or a truth; theta means sure, firm, or reliable, or something that has these features. Adding the suffix -to turns these words into adverbs. Here I'm not really sure about the relative merits of the above translations, or even if there is a difference between "X does not obtain as a truth" or "X does not in truth obtain." Not that this matters greatly; the crux of the matter is obviously the word anupalabbhamāne. The difference between my old rendering and the Ñāṇamoli/Bodhi one is that I had taken saccato thetato to be an adverbial qualification of anupalabbhamāne, whereas Ñāṇamoli and Bodhi make it more like an adjectival qualification of "self and what belongs to self." I now think that their rendering is more likely to be correct. At least it seems to accord better with the Ṭīkā to this sutta.

Best wishes,
Dhammanando Bhikkhu