The Living Computer
Photo: Buddhadāsa Indapañño Archives C06439
“I somewhat understand anattā and therefore the impossibility of a self, soul, being reincarnated, but I feel it doesn’t have to be a self that goes to a new life. It can be a momentum towards self, established in ignorance. This tendency towards the self concept may continue in universal mind and therefore create a new physical body. Do you think this could be so?”
~ Response by Buddhadāsa Bhikkhu ~
It is possible, it’s very possible that through all the many many times that attā, the ‘self’ concept, has been born in our minds, that this will develop a momentum, that this momentum will be within what are called the anusaya (the latent tendencies), which are kind of stored in the substratum of the mind. Through the constant birth of the self concept of attā, this tendency towards attā, towards self, develops and grows stronger and then has a certain momentum. So this is possible, however it’s all merely a matter of idappaccayatā. The tendencies, the birth of the self concept and so on, are merely due to causes and conditions. They happen because of the law of idappaccayatā and therefore it is all anattā, not-self.
So, these tendencies build up in the subconscious or the substratum of the mind and develop a momentum, but both this tendency towards attā and this momentum are not-self. They should never be taken to be self because they’re just natures, just natural things happening according to the law of nature, the law of conditionality. And so it would be totally incorrect to consider them or to call them ‘selves.’ They’re just anattā or not-self.
As for this universal mind that you mentioned, in Buddhism there is no such thing as universal mind. In certain other religions, however, they have universal self or universal soul, but that is something that doesn’t exist in Buddhism. In Buddhism there is just eternal voidness. Other religions, such as the Hindus, have their universal self or their eternal self, eternal soul, but in Buddhism there’s only eternal voidness – the eternal voidness that is absolutely void of self. And so perhaps the questioner has confused this idea of universal self or eternal self and come up with the idea of universal mind, however this is not a concept in Buddhism. Buddhism only speaks about universal or eternal voidness.
To speak of universal mind, this is probably a transformation of the universal self of other religions when we transform this universal self into universal mind. But there is no such thing in Buddhism because this universal mind will probably revert back to the universal self.
So in Buddhism we have both universal and eternal, but it’s the universal void, the eternal void rather than self.
You seem to have understood half of the matter, and that’s very very good. Keep trying, keep working on it because there remains half of the matter which you have not yet understood.
(From the retreat “The Living Computer,” as translated from the Thai by Santikaro)
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Dhamma Questions & Responses sessions were offered by Buddhadāsa Bhikkhu in 1990-1991 to foreign meditators attending Suan Mokkh International Dharma Hermitage courses.
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