George S. Lteif:
I have read the passage in MCTB on True Self vs. No self and still cannot grasp this fundamental concept in Buddhism.
If all the 5 aggregates (including consciounsess) are impermanent, then who is watching the aggregates arise and pass away? Is it awareness? If so, then what is awareness, isn't is subject to the 3Cs as well?
The process itself rolls and knows, there isn't a knower. There isn't an 'awareness' that exists in and of itself, there isn't any awareness besides 'in the seen just the seen, in the heard just the heard, in the cognized just the cognized'. The seen/heard/sensed without a knower is lucid and vivid. The 3Cs apply.
http://awakeningtoreality.blogspot.com.au/2013/09/joel-agee-appearances-are-self.html
Joel Agee: "I don't find an ever-present awareness that observes anything, or that experiences thoughts, etc. Seeing, hearing, smelling, etc. happen spontaneously on their own. Attention is an afterthought. A moment ago some leaves in a flower box outside my window were quivering in a breeze. The immediacy of that movement -- or of any occurrence in the micro-instant of its arising -- is all the awareness and presence there is."
Does this relate to reincarnation in any way? I never really understood this...What exactly reincarnates?
Anyone can help?
Thanks.
As Ven. Dhammanando puts it:
http://www.lioncity.net/buddhism/index.php?showtopic=41811&mode=linear
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QUOTE(Darkknight @ Jan 8 2007, 06:17 AM)
Q. So there is no self (Atman). so what exactly is it that is reborn, and how does what is reborn pass from one body to another?
Thanks in advance for any answers received. bow.gif
-----------------------------The question is wrongly put and the Buddha's reponse when asked such a question was to reject it as an improper question. Having rejected the question he would then inform the questioner of what he ought to have asked: "With what as condition is there birth?"
The reason that it is an improper question is that rebirth is taught as the continuation of a process, and not as the passing on of any sort of entity. For a more complete exposition of the subject see Mahasi Sayadaw's Discourse on Paticcasamuppada.
Best wishes,
Dhammanando Bhikkhu
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http://newbuddhist.com/forum/showthread.php?t=4215
Continuing consciousness after death is, in most religions, a matter of revealed truth. In Buddhism, the evidence comes from the contemplative experience of people who are certainly not ordinary but who are sufficiently numerous that what they say about it is worth taking seriously into account. Indeed, such testimonies begin with those of the Buddha himself.
Nevertheless, it’s important to understand that what’s called reincarnation in Buddhism has nothing to do with the transmigration of some ‘entity’ or other. It’s not a process of metempsychosis because there is no ‘soul’. As long as one thinks in terms of entities rather than function and continuity, it’s impossible to understand the Buddhist concept of rebirth. As it’s said, ‘There is no thread passing through the beads of the necklace of rebirths.’ Over successive rebirths, what is maintained is not the identity of a ‘person’, but the conditioning of a stream of consciousness.
Additionally, Buddhism speaks of successive states of existence; in other words, everything isn’t limited to just one lifetime. We’ve experienced other states of existence before our birth in this lifetime, and we’ll experience others after death. This, of course, leads to a fundamental question: is there a nonmaterial consciousness distinct from the body? It would be virtually impossible to talk about reincarnation without first examining the relationship between body and mind. Moreover, since Buddhism denies the existence of any self that could be seen as a separate entity capable of transmigrating from one existence to another by passing from one body to another, one might well wonder what it could be that links those successive states of existence together.
One could possibly understand it better by considering it as a continuum, a stream of consciousness that continues to flow without there being any fixed or autonomous entity running through it… Rather it could be likened to a river without a boat, or to a lamp flame that lights a second lamp, which in-turn lights a third lamp, and so on and so forth; the flame at the end of the process is neither the same flame as at the outset, nor a completely different one…
~ rizenfenix