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Could you summarize the "research" and "evidence" before I spend an hour of my life watching this? Is there anything besides past-life regression and near-death experiences?
Oddly-inconsistent with the idea of anatta, or the lack of an essential and immutable self. Seems to me that if reincarnation as it is popularly-understood were to be somehow proven, it would effectively prove the existence of a self. Not sure if that'd be a problem for some Buddhists.
Question for the more-experienced Buddhists in the crowd: Is there some way to reconcile reincarnation with anatta? Or am I going in the right direction to feel that these things just don't make sense together?
As a qualified hypnotherapist I never practice 'past life regression' because it is far too unreliable a method to take any notice of. We can store all sorts of memories from babyhood and then forget that they're there. Even memories of photos, films, books and articles read, places visited, people seen, etc etc and then they can re-emerge forming a narrative.
Please check out 'cryptomnesia'
Even a Tibetan Buddhist teacher once told me that practising' past life regression' was a time waster because people make things up.
I don't see any doctrinal contradiction between reincarnation and anatta. After all, you can't have rebirth in the human or animal realm without reincarnation.
Past life regression is indeed unreliable and there is a problem with false memories. Yet, there are plenty of strong cases and the cited video clip contains such a collection of strong cases. They are interesting, because the things that came up during hypnosis are later verified by travelling to the locations and investigating the claims.
Oddly-inconsistent with the idea of anatta, or the lack of an essential and immutable self. Seems to me that if reincarnation as it is popularly-understood were to be somehow proven, it would effectively prove the existence of a self. Not sure if that'd be a problem for some Buddhists.
Question for the more-experienced Buddhists in the crowd: Is there some way to reconcile reincarnation with anatta? Or am I going in the right direction to feel that these things just don't make sense together?
Sorry but what is it with a anatta that is inconsistent with rebirth and why does rebirth require an essential and immutable self?
In fact how could an immutable self be reborn since rebirth implies change?
Could you summarize the "research" and "evidence" before I spend an hour of my life watching this? Is there anything besides past-life regression and near-death experiences?
Question for the more-experienced Buddhists in the crowd: Is there some way to reconcile reincarnation with anatta? Or am I going in the right direction to feel that these things just don't make sense together?
Anatta is the teaching that all things are non-self; no matter how much you look, you won't find something that is self. I'm not sure why this needs to be reconciled with reincarnation/rebirth.
RenGalskap: Well, personally, I don't reconcile it with rebirth. I don't believe that there is some kind of core "me" that is more my "self" than the hair or fingernails I trim intermittently, or the clothes I wear, or the glasses on my face. As a result, it's kind of odd to me that I should be simultaneously expected to believe that I'm going to be born into another body after this one dies.
My question is this: if there is nothing about me or inside me that is more "me" than the rings on my fingers (or my f***ing khakis, as Tyler Durden would include), then what exactly is reborn? What about me ends up in another form, living life all over again?
These two things just don't seem to me to be beliefs that mesh well. Can somebody who believes both of them explain how they work together? Right now I don't see it, but I'm sure somebody else does.
Metaphorically, anatta is liken to human soul, it has no fix sizes, it goes along with the mutable self. A baby > toddler > tenager > adult > old folks, an inseparable entity. So, the soul can never remain the same fix size of a baby as it encompasses the entire body system. There seemed to be no contradiction...
What about me ends up in another form, living life all over again?
Your citta. There is continuity in the evolving process that is your citta. And of course, the process is also determined by karma: "Karma is the field, consciousness the seed, craving the moisture."
What's the difference between the idea of a "citta" and the idea of a "soul" which passes from form to form? The idea that I have a soul which is the "real me" seems kind of... well, exactly what Buddhism is always saying we don't have. If I have a "me" made of some kind of spirit-stuff that can transcend this material body after its death and be recycled into another form, then how exactly is that not Self with a Capital S?
If I'm coming across as difficult or confrontational, I apologize. It's not my intention. I'm just really not able to get into a perspective which holds these two beliefs at the same time, and even if it's not what I end up choosing to believe... I'd really like to at least see where people are coming from who do, y'know?
Maybe you have trouble with it because words like citta are nouns that might suggest an entity. You just have to get rid of the noun/entity understanding and move to an activity/process understanding instead. Like waves on an ocean. Although the word wave is a noun, and for a moment in time, one can point out a shape that corresponds to this supposed entity, it does not really exist. There is an underlying process, kinetic energy acting on a body of water in case of a wave, and citta acting in a field of karma in case of beings.
What about me ends up in another form, living life all over again?
Rebirth doesn't require that anything about you end up in another form. That'
s why a lot of Buddhists prefer to use the term "rebirth" instead of "reincarnation". "Rebirth" just implies that birth happens again. It doesn't necessarily mean that something is reborn.
My favorite analogy for rebirth is the old joke about the farmer who owned the same ax for fifty years. He replaced the head twice and the handle five times, but it was the same ax! Obviously, the final ax had nothing that came from the original ax. But also, the original ax was part of the conditions that lead to the birth, or coming into existence, of the final ax.
Might as well say that it's about the carbon cycle, then. The carbon in me was probably carbon in an exploding star (and in fact, this is part of why calcium is so abundant that it ended up in our bones), and will someday be the carbon in something I couldn't possibly foresee. Certainly won't be "me," though, and it'd be hard to say that whatever matter my carbon ends up getting into is a "rebirth" of me any more than it's a "rebirth" of the star it shot out of.
Seems like a weird way of referring to it. Is it just a language/translation issue where the word doesn't mean quite the same thing in English, or am I still not quite grokking it?
Might as well say that it's about the carbon cycle, then. The carbon in me was probably carbon in an exploding star (and in fact, this is part of why calcium is so abundant that it ended up in our bones), and will someday be the carbon in something I couldn't possibly foresee.
Are you responding to me? This doesn't follow from what I said. It contradicts it.
Maybe you have trouble with it because words like citta are nouns that might suggest an entity. You just have to get rid of the noun/entity understanding and move to an activity/process understanding instead. Like waves on an ocean. Although the word wave is a noun, and for a moment in time, one can point out a shape that corresponds to this supposed entity, it does not really exist. There is an underlying process, kinetic energy acting on a body of water in case of a wave, and citta acting in a field of karma in case of beings.
RenGalskap: No, Truthseeker also posted before you did. Your post actually showed up while I was typing the response to his. I like the axe analogy, but even in that case it seems like the joke is that calling that the same axe or even an iteration of the same axe is laughably imprecise and an outgrowth of the owner's attachment to "his" axe. If he weren't so attached to owning the same axe that he'd owned before, to a need for some kind of consoling woodshed-tool continuity, then he'd just say, "Yeah. It's basically a new axe now, but it's the one I have," and there'd be no joke.
Truthseeker: The carbon cycle was an analogy. I'm a little surprised it didn't come across that way, but I'll explain it again. If the bits made of whatever non-matter-non-empirically-verifiable-spirit-stuff are dispersed and reassembled and mixed with spirit-stuff that we wouldn't have previously identified as being part of our "soul" then what emerges from the rebirth is no more connected to who and what we used to be than the calcium in my bones makes me a "rebirth" of the star they exploded from.
Do you at least see what I'm saying? Because I feel like you responded to some totally different argument that I wasn't making. I hope this clears things up.
I'm a bit agnostic on the whole literal reincarnation idea...
but I think the issue may be with trying to understand both reincarnation and anatta is purely point of view/focus... What I mean is..
Cobalt, we do not know each other, agreed? Yet we are different people right?
Without knowing me, how are we different?
Different parents? Born different times? Different places? Different upbringing? Different appearance? Different experiences?
And yet, without knowing anything about me, you know that we are also similar, right?
We were both born. We are both human. We both have bodies. We both have a mind. We are both alive. We both are conscious. We both have 'emotions'. We both have karma. We both will die.
in fact we're so similar, that if we changed just one thing, and I was born to your parents, and you were born to my parents, I'd be "you", and you'd be "me".
I think the problem with understanding reincarnation (and it's just my opinion) comes from focusing on the differences.
You die. Your body dies. Your brain dies. what's left, your conciousness and your karma.
You can argue that consciousness is a purely a by-product of the brain, but I'll ask you to provide empirical evidence, and you won't be able to supply it. So we can save ourselves some time and accept we don't fully understand consciousness and for the purpose of my explanation it survives after death.
Your conciousness, like every thing in the whole universe, doesn't cease to exist, but is reborn into something else. What you are reborn as is based on your karma.
Once again you will have been born, have a body, have a mind, have conciousness, have emotions, be alive, have karma, will die.
What's different is the circumstances, different parents, different appearance, which leads to different upbringing, different experiances..and so forth that will develop your new "self".
The self is temporary. A byproduct of the circumstances of your incarnation. When that incarnation ends, it ends. That is how anatta and reincarnation exist together. Anatta is translated as "no-soul" is a bit misleading, anatta is no-self.
At least that's my general understanding, I could be way off.
If the bits made of whatever non-matter-non-empirically-verifiable-spirit-stuff are dispersed and reassembled and mixed with spirit-stuff that we wouldn't have previously identified as being part of our "soul" then what emerges from the rebirth is no more connected to who and what we used to be than the calcium in my bones makes me a "rebirth" of the star they exploded from.
Here you go again. -- There is no "spirit stuff". There is nothing dispersed, mixed, and reassembled. The word "stuff" implies matter. You are applying ideas drawn from the material world, but these ideas will just confuse you. Citta and karma are not physical entities. Continuity doesn't mean atom recycling.
Just out of curiosity: has anyone actually watched the video clip which is the topic of this thread?
Comments
Question for the more-experienced Buddhists in the crowd: Is there some way to reconcile reincarnation with anatta? Or am I going in the right direction to feel that these things just don't make sense together?
Please check out 'cryptomnesia'
Even a Tibetan Buddhist teacher once told me that practising' past life regression' was a time waster because people make things up.
.
Past life regression is indeed unreliable and there is a problem with false memories. Yet, there are plenty of strong cases and the cited video clip contains such a collection of strong cases. They are interesting, because the things that came up during hypnosis are later verified by travelling to the locations and investigating the claims.
Cheers, Thomas
Sorry but what is it with a anatta that is inconsistent with rebirth and why does rebirth require an essential and immutable self?
In fact how could an immutable self be reborn since rebirth implies change?
What do you mean by essential in this context?
/Victor
/Victor
My question is this: if there is nothing about me or inside me that is more "me" than the rings on my fingers (or my f***ing khakis, as Tyler Durden would include), then what exactly is reborn? What about me ends up in another form, living life all over again?
These two things just don't seem to me to be beliefs that mesh well. Can somebody who believes both of them explain how they work together? Right now I don't see it, but I'm sure somebody else does.
Your citta. There is continuity in the evolving process that is your citta. And of course, the process is also determined by karma: "Karma is the field, consciousness the seed, craving the moisture."
Cheers, Thomas
If I'm coming across as difficult or confrontational, I apologize. It's not my intention. I'm just really not able to get into a perspective which holds these two beliefs at the same time, and even if it's not what I end up choosing to believe... I'd really like to at least see where people are coming from who do, y'know?
Cheers, Thomas
s why a lot of Buddhists prefer to use the term "rebirth" instead of "reincarnation". "Rebirth" just implies that birth happens again. It doesn't necessarily mean that something is reborn.
My favorite analogy for rebirth is the old joke about the farmer who owned the same ax for fifty years. He replaced the head twice and the handle five times, but it was the same ax! Obviously, the final ax had nothing that came from the original ax. But also, the original ax was part of the conditions that lead to the birth, or coming into existence, of the final ax.
Seems like a weird way of referring to it. Is it just a language/translation issue where the word doesn't mean quite the same thing in English, or am I still not quite grokking it?
In RenGalskamp's example it is function that continues. As for human beings, it is citta and karma. These are not material things.
Cheers, Thomas
Truthseeker: The carbon cycle was an analogy. I'm a little surprised it didn't come across that way, but I'll explain it again. If the bits made of whatever non-matter-non-empirically-verifiable-spirit-stuff are dispersed and reassembled and mixed with spirit-stuff that we wouldn't have previously identified as being part of our "soul" then what emerges from the rebirth is no more connected to who and what we used to be than the calcium in my bones makes me a "rebirth" of the star they exploded from.
Do you at least see what I'm saying? Because I feel like you responded to some totally different argument that I wasn't making. I hope this clears things up.
but I think the issue may be with trying to understand both reincarnation and anatta is purely point of view/focus... What I mean is..
Cobalt, we do not know each other, agreed? Yet we are different people right?
Without knowing me, how are we different?
Different parents? Born different times? Different places? Different upbringing? Different appearance? Different experiences?
And yet, without knowing anything about me, you know that we are also similar, right?
We were both born. We are both human. We both have bodies. We both have a mind. We are both alive. We both are conscious. We both have 'emotions'. We both have karma. We both will die.
in fact we're so similar, that if we changed just one thing, and I was born to your parents, and you were born to my parents, I'd be "you", and you'd be "me".
I think the problem with understanding reincarnation (and it's just my opinion) comes from focusing on the differences.
You die. Your body dies. Your brain dies. what's left, your conciousness and your karma.
You can argue that consciousness is a purely a by-product of the brain, but I'll ask you to provide empirical evidence, and you won't be able to supply it. So we can save ourselves some time and accept we don't fully understand consciousness and for the purpose of my explanation it survives after death.
Your conciousness, like every thing in the whole universe, doesn't cease to exist, but is reborn into something else. What you are reborn as is based on your karma.
Once again you will have been born, have a body, have a mind, have conciousness, have emotions, be alive, have karma, will die.
What's different is the circumstances, different parents, different appearance, which leads to different upbringing, different experiances..and so forth that will develop your new "self".
The self is temporary. A byproduct of the circumstances of your incarnation. When that incarnation ends, it ends. That is how anatta and reincarnation exist together. Anatta is translated as "no-soul" is a bit misleading, anatta is no-self.
At least that's my general understanding, I could be way off.
Here you go again. -- There is no "spirit stuff". There is nothing dispersed, mixed, and reassembled. The word "stuff" implies matter. You are applying ideas drawn from the material world, but these ideas will just confuse you. Citta and karma are not physical entities. Continuity doesn't mean atom recycling.
Just out of curiosity: has anyone actually watched the video clip which is the topic of this thread?
Cheers, Thomas