the Pali being:
So muṭṭhassati kālaṃ kurumāno aññataraṃ devanikāyaṃ upapajjati.
and the last word, translated as ‘reborn’, is given in the dictionary as:
enters upon, enters (a state); appears; comes into existence (in); is reborn (in); 2. is fit for, is suitable.
My understanding of the term/a non-momentary psychological understanding, covers the first three possible meanings in the first group of meanings.
Of course, those holding the multiple life theory (rather than simply multiple birth), will choose the last option in the first group of possible meanings.
I don’t see any point to discuss it, unless a distinction is clearly seen between multiple lives and multiple births and it is acknowledged that there is scant evidence the Buddha used a term that can be definitely and simply translated as ‘rebirth’, as I would expect from an unsurpassed teacher, such as: puna-jati, or jati-puna-punam
Though in the context of DO birth ( jati ) is clearly used in the plural sense - phrases like “the various orders of beings”:
“And what, bhikkhus, is birth? The birth of the various beings into the various orders of beings, their being born, descent into the womb, production, the manifestation of the aggregates, the obtaining of the sense bases. This is called birth."
And in DO old age and death arise in dependence upon birth. This contradicts your idea that it is only birth that is being described, rather than whole lives:
“And what, bhikkhus, is aging-and-death? The aging of the various beings in the various orders of beings, their growing old, brokenness of teeth, greyness of hair, wrinkling of skin, decline of vitality, degeneration of the faculties: this is called aging. The passing away of the various beings from the various orders of beings, their perishing, breakup, disappearance, mortality, death, completion of time, the breakup of the aggregates, the laying down of the carcass: this is called death. Thus this aging and this death are together called aging-and-death."
And these descriptions of birth, old age and death are clearly biological/physical, which contradicts your psychological interpretation.
In this case it means much more than learning by rote. The sequence
They’ve followed those teachings by ear, reinforced them by recitation, examined them by the mind, and well comprehended them theoretically …
implies a gradual deepening of understanding, ending with “well-comprehended them theoretically”, which in the Pali reads as diṭṭhiyā suppaṭividdhā, implying a thorough comprehension. Bhikkhu Bodhi translates this as “well penetrated by view”, which often will be reference to streamentry, but perhaps not invariably so. I have to admit I am bit puzzled by @sujato’s translation, which to my mind does not give enough emphasis to the experiential aspect.
The deeper your understanding, the greater the likelihood you will continue in your next life where you left off in this one.
With translation it is normally not enough just to choose one’s preferred rendering from a list in a dictionary. Each of the suggested dictionary renderings will tend to be used in a particular context and you need to match up these contexts with the one you are translating. The best dictionaries, such as the new PTS dictionary, actually quote from the Pali texts to show the context for the different English renderings of a particular Pali word. Once you a look at the texts in this way, the number of possible renderings tends to come down significantly.
Yes, and the meaning of language is always dependent upon the context. Imposing a preferred meaning regardless of context makes it very difficult to objectively assess the ( original ) intended meaning. I have also seen people who are strongly attached to a preconceived interpretation when reading suttas. The tendency then is to try and make the words fit their preconceptions, which often leads to banging square pegs into round holes - a bit of a mess!
It’s certainly possible that the suttas were “Hinduised” at some stage in their development, and/or that the early sangha developed different interpretations of what the Buddha taught. Or perhaps Stephen Batchelor’s thesis of skillful means is correct, that the Buddha was just using ideas in common parlance at the time, eg reincarnation.
But I don’t see how it’s possible to be prove that this is the case.
Recently I was reading the Bhagavad Gita ( a Hindu text ), and while there are clear differences compared with the suttas, I was also struck by the similarities. I don’t think we can now establish with any certainty how radically the Buddha’s teaching diverged from the predominant religious beliefs of that period.
I would like to read more about this if possible. I was reading yesterday quotes from Origen, a church father and others that taught reincarnation exactly in the way it is taught in Buddhism (to liberate us from consant rebirth we follow this path). In fact there is a church father who prayed to God that he could find salvation so he would not have to return to this world. I can get you the quotes if you desire.
I very much agree. For the most part it’s a difference of vocabulary. The main difference seems to be in the final goal. For them it seems to be one of eternal being, becoming one with the brahman or universe. In the Buddha-dhamma its neither being or not-being. It’s the middle way in between. Eradication of craving for any sort of being or not-being.
Yes, and these goals are based on different assumptions. For example Hinduism assumes the existence of a “higher self” or “soul”, something “beneath” the ego, beneath the personal.
Buddhism denies this, though sometimes descriptions of Nibbana sound a little similar to descriptions of Atman/Brahman.
Yes, in this document (PDF) The Hinduisation of the Buddha's Teaching | Joe Smith - Academia.edu, I suggest the popular (common) version of DO, is a Hinduised version and not original. I also point to another version which does not speak of birth (ageing or death) specifically, only suffering and this hardly known version, matches the general presentation of the gradual path we find in many suttas. The standard one does not. So, to me, it should be doubted as original, as we have the saying “those who see DO see Dhamma (and vice versa)” and the Path is part of Dhamma.
In any case, just because we might find descriptions of death etc in what seem to be physical terms, that does not mean they are original. When such occurrences contradict a CLEAR redefinition from the Buddha, then that puts them in the highly suspicious category, for me. I linked to the my collection of redefinitions by the Buddha ((PDF) 20120701 The Noble Language - Thesis Extract.pdf | Joe Smith - Academia.edu), but you seem not to have read that. The very obvious one is:
“Death” (maraṇa): “For this, monks, is death in the Noble One’s Discipline:
that one gives up the training and returns to the lower life” (Bodhi 2000:
p. 711)13. The Buddha, thus, does not use “death” to refer to the end of his life
(nor probably any Arahanta’s life). That is called the “breaking-up of the body”
(kāyassa bhedā) or the “the exhaustion of the life-span” (jīvitapariyādānā)
(Walshe 1995: p. 90).
I don’t have any problem with the idea of multiple births (of one person or many people), as I have said. Irrelevant to whether I accept the standard (common) DO.
it would seem so and things are not always as they seem
I have read somewhere in the Suttas that ‘womb’ and ‘mother’ mean ‘desire’ and ‘father’ means ‘ignorance’. Haven’t found references yet.
If one has a psychological (mind-made) image of oneself, it would also involve a birth (origin), ageing (change) and death (ending) and the various aspects of the image, such as hair, would change over time.
If one believes one has the answer already, one will not even try to understand a different perspective. That would be the nature of Wrong View and arrogance.
I’m glad we both agree on that, but what I get is, you are subtly accusing me of this. That would be unkind.
Various options of translations, I understand, are listed in order of prevalence, or occurrence.
Yes, I’m familiar with that, but it is quite something else to suggest that the Buddha used terms with such imprecision, or with such proliferation of meaning. That is not the quality of ‘a great man’ or ‘an unexcelled teacher’ but rather a common worldly teacher, imo.
If he did use terms in that way, I could not see how one could take oneself as a refuge, but would have to rely on established tradition, with those who have been approved to interpret the texts = commentators.
Stephen Batchelor’s? This is the common stance of the Mahayana and found in Theravada in the doctrine of conventional and ultimate truths, which is also dependent on interpretation, not a clear statement from the Buddha like “I teach the Four Noble Truths”.
I don’t see how it’s possible to prove it to another, but I have seen how one can prove it to oneself, that is, I believe, by developing Right View thru wise study and practice.
There is a difference between someone who has tested the common view, found it faulty and given it up and presents a different view, to another who still follows the common view, but I can’t know if another follows the common view simply out of faith, rather than with personal experience.
Without direct personal testing/experience, it was just a matter of interpretation and opinion to me.
Since my new birth, I would never make statements about ‘us all’ as if I could read peoples’ minds and know their state of development or under-development. Making such statements without that knowledge, is just arrogance, to me. I’m not interested in continuing this discussion with you.
That’s fine. Note that I haven’t dismissed your interpretation, I have just observed that it can only be an interpretation, given that we are looking back 2,500 years in time.
There are a lot of threads so I’d assume a fresh opinion on questions would be fine since we arent all the same.
I didn’t get to read all your posts. Are you following Dharmic teachings now? The monastary life is probably similar but of course not needed for practice.
I used to be in nichiren Shoshu and SGI so I’m familiar. I didn’t know other lineages are similar maybe NShu.
