無我論 Anatta: The Teaching of No-Soul

Anatta: The Teaching of No-Soul

無我論：

The Buddha countered all soul-theory and soul-speculation with His Anatta doctrine. Anatta is translated under various labels: No-soul, No-self, egolessness, and soullessness.

To understand the Anatta doctrine, one must understand that the eternal soul theory _ ‘I have a soul’ _ and the material theory _ ‘I have no soul’ _are both obstacles to self-realization or salvation. They arise from the misconception ‘I AM’. Hence, to understand the Anatta doctrine, one must not cling to any opinion or views on soul-theory; rather, one must try to see things objectively as they are and without any mental projections. One must learn to see the so-called ‘I’ or Sour or Self for what it really is : merely a combination of changing forces. This requires some analytical explanation.

The Buddha taught that what we conceive as something eternal within us, is merely a combination of physical and mental aggregates or forces (pancakkhandha), made up of body or matter (rupakkhandha), sensation (vedanakkhandha), perception (sannakkhandha), mental formations (samkharakkhandha) and consciousness (vinnanakkhandha). These forces are working together in a flux of momentary change; they are never the same for two consecutive moments. They are the component forces of the psycho-physical life. When the Buddha analyzed the psycho-physical life, He found only these five aggregates or forces. He did not find any eternal soul. However, many people still have the misconception that the soul is the consciousness. The Buddha declared in unequivocal terms that consciousness depends on matter, sensation, perception and mental formations and that is cannot exist independently of them.

佛陀以「無我論」反駁了一切靈魂和靈魂思想。無我(Anatta)，可解釋為沒有自我或沒有靈魂的存在，要了解無我，必須先了解「常見」──即認為世間有個恆常的『我』或『我所有』，和「斷見」──認為沒有任何的因、沒有任何的緣，人死亡後色法、名法都滅盡，死後什麼都不存在了。「常見」和「斷見」都是由「我執」生起的「邪見」。要了解「無我」就不要執著于任何靈魂學說或思想。相反的，我們必須客觀的、實事求是的去了解事物的本性，不要憑感覺而捕風捉影。一個人必須先要了解「我」、「我執」、「靈魂」到底是什麼？這一切只不過是因緣條件的假合和變化罷了。這一點需要進一步的分析，佛陀教導我們：那些我們認為永恆的，其實是名色和五蘊的因緣假合，身體是色(物質)、名(心識)和五蘊(色、受、想、行、識)所組成的，這些力量一直在發生作用和不停的變化，它們沒有一個片刻是相同的。它們組成了身、心和感官。當佛陀分析身、心和感官時，他只發現了五蘊中「識」的力量，並沒有發現靈魂的存在。但是，很多人對「識」產生錯覺，以為「識」就是「靈魂」。佛陀分析的很清楚，識是依賴受、想、行而存在，「識」無法單獨存在。

The Buddha said, ‘The body, O monks, is not the Self. Sensation is not the Self. Perception is not the Self. The mental constructions are not the Self. And neither is consciousness the Self. Perceiving this, O monks, the disciple sets no value on the body, or on sensation, or on perception, or on mental constructions, or on consciousness. Setting no value of them, he becomes free of passions and he is liberated. The knowledge of liberation arises there within him. And then he knows that he has done what has to be done, that he has lived the holy life, that he is no longer becoming this or that, that his rebirth is destroyed.’ (Anatta-Lakkhana Sutta).

「諸比庫！色中無我、受中無我、想中無我、行中無我、識中無我。諸比庫！了解了這一些，就不會把價值觀建立在色、受、想、行、識上面。就這樣，他能棄除煩惱而獲得解脫，解脫的智慧也因此而產生。跟著，他清楚的了解自己的所作所為，修行的基礎也奠定了，以後不再有輪迴了。」《無我相經》(Anattalakkhaõa Suttaü)

The Anatta doctrine of the Buddha is over 2500 years old. Today the thought current of the modern scientific world is flowing towards the Buddha’s Teaching of Anatta or No-Soul. In the eyes of the modern scientists, man is merely a bundle of ever-changing sensations. Modern physicists say that the apparently solid universe is not, in reality, composed of solid substance at all, but actually a flux of energy. The modern physicist sees the whole universe as a process of transformation of various forces of which man is a mere part. The Buddha was the first to realize this.

佛陀的「無我論」在二千五百多年前提出，和今天的科學思潮是一致的。在現代科學家眼里，人類只是一堆一直在變化的感受。現代物理學家認為，宇宙堅實的外表，實際是不存在的，宇宙只不過是一種「能」的流變。現代物理學家了解，宇宙的整個轉變過程是由許多物質聚集而成的，而人類只不過是其中的一小部分。而這一切佛陀在二千五百多年前就已經了解了。

A prominent author, W. S. Wily, once said, ‘The existence of the immortal in man is becoming increasingly discredited under the influence of the dominant schools of modern thought.’ The belief in the immortality of the soul is a dogma that is contradicted by the most solid, empirical truth.

一位傑出的作家 W.S.維利說過：「在現代思想的主要學派中，人類不滅靈魂的存在已經受到懷疑了。」靈魂不滅的信念，是教條主義，它牴觸了可被證實的真理。

The mere belief in an immortal soul, or the conviction that something in us survives death, does not make us immortal unless we know what it is that survives and that we are capable of identifying ourselves with it. Most human beings choose death instead of immortality by identifying themselves with that which is perishable and impermanent by clinging stubbornly to the body or the momentary elements of the present personality, which they mistake for the soul or the essential form of life.

靈魂不滅的信仰，相信在我們死後還有某些東西存在。可是這存在物到底能不能令我們永恆的存在？除非，我們有能力知道那存在物到底是什麼？並且，我們還要證明我們到底是不是存在于那存在物里面？可是，大多數人寧可相信死後有不滅的靈魂的存在，他們頑強的執著與攀緣于肉體或人性的某些因緣假合的東西，並錯誤的認為靈魂是生命的基本形式。

About those researches of modern scientists who are now more inclined to assert that the so-called ‘Soul’ is no more than a bundle of sensations, emotions, sentiments, all relating to the physical experiences, Prof. James says that the term ‘Soul’ is a mere figure of speech to which no reality corresponds.

It is the same Anatta doctrine of the Buddha that was introduced in the Mahayana school of Buddhism as Sunyata or voidness. Although this concept was elaborated by a great Mahayana scholar, Nagarjuna, by giving various interpretations, there is no extraordinary concept in Sunyata far different from the Buddha’s original doctrine of Anatta.

現代科學家通過研究後，對所謂「靈魂」描述如下：「靈魂只不過是一些感知、感受的情緒，與生理的經驗互相作用的關系。」詹姆斯教授說：「靈魂這名詞，最多是代表語言的一種圖象，並不反應任何事實。」佛陀的「無我論」在大乘佛教里，稱為「空性」或「空義」。這觀念是由大乘著名學者龍樹(Nagarjuna)大士提出的。但是「空性」(Sunyata)並非有別于「無我」，也不見得比佛陀原始的教義「無我論」 來得高明。

The belief in soul or Self and the Creator God, is so strongly rooted in the minds of many people that they cannot imagine why the Buddha did not accept these two issues which are indispensable to many religions. In fact some people got a shock or became nervous and tried to show their emotion when they heard that the Buddha rejected these two concepts. That is the main reason why to many unbiased scholars and psychologists Buddhism stands unique when compared to all the other religions. At the same time, some other scholars who appreciate the various other aspects of Buddhism thought that Buddhism would be enriched by deliberately re-interpreting the Buddha word ‘Atta’ in order to introduce the concept of Soul and Self into Buddhism. The Buddha was aware of this unsatisfactoriness of man and the conceptual upheaval regarding this belief.

All conditioned things are impermanent, All conditioned things are Dukka? Suffering, All conditioned or unconditioned things are soulless or selfless. (Dhammapada 277, 278, 279) There is a parable in our Buddhist texts with regard to the belief in an eternal soul. A man, who mistook a moving rope for a snake, became terrified by that fear in his mind. Upon discovery that it was only a piece of rope, his fear subsided and his mind became peaceful. The belief in an eternal soul is equated to the rope? man’s imagination.

相信靈魂、自我或造物者的存在，已成為一般的的想法。佛陀為何不接受這種多數宗教都認為絕對必要的說法？事實，當許多外道得知佛陀拒絕這種觀念時，感到十分的驚訝。但是，很多對佛教存有偏見的學者或心理學家，在深入的研究和比較後，都與佛教站在同一立場。也有一些學者，他們固然非常欣賞佛教，可是卻企圖將靈魂或自我的觀念推薦給佛教，曲解了「無我論」，以為這樣就可以把佛教發揚光大。可是，佛陀早就覺察到，這種思想是一種邪見，對人性的提升一點幫助也沒有。

一切行無常。

一切受是苦。

一切法無我。

《法句經》V227、228、229

在佛經里，有一則關于靈魂的寓言故事：「有如把一條動著的繩子當作是一條蛇，因此內心產生了不必要的恐懼，當他發現那是繩子時，那種恐懼就完全消失了。」相信不滅的靈魂，就好比那個人對繩子產生的錯覺──其實，只不過是個人心中的想像罷了。