What transmigrates from life to life?

[StevieLeValley]

What transmigrates from life to life? What is it that goes from one life to the next?

[Peaceful-D]

The Buddha’s answer in the early Pali Canon refuses both obvious options. To say that a self (attā) transmigrates would be eternalism (sassatavāda); to say nothing continues would be annihilationism (ucchedavāda). He rejects both as micchā diṭṭhi - wrong view. The Mahātaṇhāsankhaya Sutta (MN 38) is particularly direct: when the monk Sāti claims the Buddha taught that “this same consciousness transmigrates,” the Buddha sharply corrects him, insisting that viññāṇa always arises dependently and never travels as a free-standing entity.

What the Canon points toward instead is causal continuity without a continuing self - not a thing that transmigrates but a process: the momentum of kamma and taṇhā conditioning a new arising through paṭicca-samuppāda. A being cannot be said to truly exist as a substantial, persisting entity, nor can it be said to simply not exist - it is dependently arisen, which places it beyond both designations. The Sutta that describes this nicely is the Kaccānagotta Sutta (SN 12.15). The operative question the Buddha consistently redirects toward is not what transmigrates, but what sustains the process - and that is craving. Uproot craving, and the question dissolves along with the conditions that make rebirth possible.

[Khemarato.bhikkhu]

There’s a Search feature at the top of every page so you can look for previous threads about a given topic, such as

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Rebirth (the nitty-gritty)

When we die, what exactly gets reborn in the next life? There is no permanent self (no atta), so an impermanent self must be reborn somehow. Through what medium does this self pass into the next conscious form? If some are able to achieve attainments necessary to see past lives, there must therefore be information on past lives stored either in what is transmitted from life to life, or stored somewhere else. How should we understand these inquiries on the basis of the suttas?

What's that permanent storage that stores infinite permanent past lives data?

Continuing the discussion from Consciousness and Nibbana: is it inside or outside of the 5 aggregates ?

and so on

[StevieLeValley]

This is probably the best answer I’ve read so far to this question - and I’ve been looking, thanks!

“…not a thing that transmigrates but a process” is great. It makes me realize that I need to know more about dependent origination.

[StevieLeValley]

Thank you! I did search but must have not used the right terms. Those different threads come up with different answers. What’s your answer? Dependent origination just continues?

[Khemarato.bhikkhu]

@StevieLeValley

What’s your answer?

I would need more context on what your actual question is, but to be brief I’d say “karma.” It’s your actions that live on after you die.

[StevieLeValley]

The context is… someone dies and then is reborn. What is it, or what process is it, that passes/goes from life to life / death to birth?

Based on my research, there appear to be a few candidates:

1. mindstream (citta-santāna)

2. stream of consciousness (viññāṇasotaṃ)

3. dependent origination just continues doing its thing

4. karma

[Khemarato.bhikkhu]

It sounds like you’re asking about the metaphysics of it? Like the mechanism by which karma operates across lifetimes?

[seniya]

@StevieLeValley

What transmigrates from life to life? What is it that goes from one life to the next?

Perhaps, this quote from Milinda Panha will answer your question:

The king said: ‘What is it, Nāgasena, that is reborn?’

‘Name-and-form is reborn.’

‘What, is it this same name-and-form that is reborn?’

‘No: but by this name-and-form deeds are done, good or evil, and by these deeds (this Karma) another name-and-form is reborn.’

‘If that be so, Sir, would not the new being be released from its evil Karma ?’

The Elder replied: ‘Yes, if it were not reborn. But just because it is reborn, O king, it is therefore not released from its evil Karma.’

‘Give me an illustration.’

‘Suppose, O king, some man were to steal a mango from another man, and the owner of the mango were to seize him and bring him before the king, and charge him with the crime. And the thief were to say: “Your Majesty! I have not taken away this man’s mangoes. Those that he put in the ground are different from the ones I took. I do not deserve to be punished.” How then? would he be guilty?’

‘Certainly, Sir. He would deserve to be punished.’

‘But on what ground?’

‘Because, in spite of whatever he may say, he would be guilty in respect of the last mango which resulted from the first one (the owner set in the ground).’

‘Just so, great king, deeds good or evil are done by this name-and-form and another is reborn. But that other is not thereby released from its deeds (its Karma).’

SuttaCentral

[Brahmali]

@StevieLeValley

What transmigrates from life to life? What is it that goes from one life to the next?

What is it that “transmigrates” in this very life? It’s the same thing that transmigrates from one life to the next.

[Ceisiwr]

Between being a baby and being an adult there is no being or essence or whatnot that persists through, but neither is the baby one and the adult another. Rather there is a casual continuity, a process, over time. The same with rebirth across lives.

[StevieLeValley]

I’m just asking what “thing” or what process continues from the moment of death to the moment of birth.

What passes from one life to the next?

[StevieLeValley]

Excellent! Superb! Thank you for finding an answer in a text that is as clear as day - Name and Form are reborn. Do you know of any Nikaya sources?

[StevieLeValley]

I’m not sure what “transmigrates” in this very life…ignorance? Or dependent origination more broadly?

[Adutiya]

The way I understand it more fully is covered in AN3.76 and AN3.77.

As Peaceful D said, the bottom line is craving. Because craving generates intentional action, kamma is generated and kamma ripens. I like Bhikkhu Bodhi’s explanation (spoken here and transcribed, not written):

“Consciousness is not conceived as a single entity like a self or a soul, but consciousness is an ever-changing process, an ever-changing flux of states of consciousness. But according to the Buddha there is a continuity of consciousness, so that the consciousness in a sense moves on from one state to another, and it’s like consciousness is compared to a seed. So we could say that the consciousness of the previous existence is like a plant that has brought forth the seed and when that plant comes to an end and dies but the seed drops into the soil and springs up again, bringing into being another type of existence, another sentient being that inherits that stream of consciousness from the past life the past existence. and what keeps this process moving, what keeps living beings moving on roaming from life to life is ignorance and craving.”

[Jasudho]

@StevieLeValley

I’m not sure what “transmigrates” in this very life…

It might help to reframe “transmigrates” into “transforms.”
In direct experience, aren’t there ever-changing processes that are transforming? Feeling-tone processes felt like this, now they feel like that; thought-processes were like this, now they’re like that…

There’s no wizard behind the curtain. Transforming conditions need no inherent “anything” to transform and change, as in DN15.
So in this sense, death is just a more “radical” transformation of conditions/processes that combine into new combinations of processes called rebirth, etc.
Until this stops, conditions just roll on and on. Meaning dukkha is perpetuated.

The Buddha taught that the processes of ignorance and craving , influencing conditions called choices/kamma, are the fuels that perpetuate this now , during, and after the transformation called bodily death, as in SN56.11 and many other suttas.

[am7]

@StevieLeValley

What transmigrates from life to life? What is it that goes from one life to the next?

But why ask about ‘what’ and not about ‘who’. It’s much easier to answer who transmigrates from life to life from suttas.

[Adutiya]

Wouldn’t the answer be that there is transmigration but there isn’t a who?

[Jasudho]

Agree. If “who” refers to some unchanging essence there’s nothing like that in DO or the 4NTs.

[Radius]

I heard Ahjahn @Brahmali once asked in a Q&A whether everyone eventually reaches enlightenment to which he answered “No”. (Tagging him here solely in case I have misheard, misremembered or in any way am misrepresenting his view) Assuming that I am recalling correctly, then…

@Jasudho

Until this stops, conditions just roll on and on.

…sounds to me like the process continues eternally. Am I correctly understanding Buddhist doctrine to be that there’s no eternal self, but that there is an eternal process? (excepting enlightenment)

Even the ‘eternalists’ in DN1 effectively acknowledge that the self is changing…

And so they recollect their many kinds of past lives,