Anātman
Anātman / Anattā (अनात्मन् / Pali: anattā) — The Buddhist doctrine of non-self: the teaching that what we conventionally call "the self" is not a fixed, permanent, independently existing entity but a flowing, interdependent process — a stream of arising and passing physical and mental events (the five aggregates: rūpa, vedanā, saññā, saṃskāra, vijñāna). This stands in direct philosophical tension with the Vedāntic ātman doctrine. The Buddha did not deny that there is experience, consciousness, or continuity — he denied that these require or point toward an eternal, unchanging self. The debate between the ātman and anātman positions is one of the richest philosophical exchanges in the Indian tradition.
In Brief
- The Buddhist doctrine of non-self: the teaching that what we conventionally call "the self" is not a fixed, permanent, independently existing entity but a flowing, interdependent process — a stream of arising and passing physical and mental events (the five aggregates: rūpa, vedanā, saññā, saṃskāra, vijñāna). This stands in direct philosophical tension with the Vedāntic ātman doctrine. The Buddha did not deny that there is experience, consciousness, or continuity — he denied that these require or point toward an eternal, unchanging self. The debate between the ātman and anātman positions is one of the richest philosophical exchanges in the Indian tradition.
The Buddhist doctrine of non-self: the teaching that what we conventionally call "the self" is not a fixed, permanent, independently existing entity but a flowing, interdependent process — a stream of arising and passing physical and mental events (the five aggregates: rūpa, vedanā, saññā, saṃskāra, vijñāna). This stands in direct philosophical tension with the Vedāntic ātman doctrine. The Buddha did not deny that there is experience, consciousness, or continuity — he denied that these require or point toward an eternal, unchanging self. The debate between the ātman and anātman positions is one of the richest philosophical exchanges in the Indian tradition.