The History of Buddhist Thought c16.26

c16.26

What is the relation of the individual constituted by the five khandhas to the ātman? In the oldest texts there is none. In the sense of self, and as opposed to another (*para-*), ātman is frequent enough.¹ But even in the *Brahmajāla-sutta*, where all the heresies are supposed to be included, there is no denial of an ātman. We are there told of some who say that the self is eternal, we are told of Brahmā, who thinks himself eternal and other beings not, of others who hold that thought (*citta*), or mind (*mano*), or consciousness (*viññāṇa*) is eternal, of the eel-wriggler who refuses to say whether a Tathāgata, an emancipated one, exists after death, of those who hold that the self possessing form or in some other mode exists after death, and of those who hold that the self, whether the bodily self consisting of the four elements or a finer mental self, perishes at death. No question is raised as to whether the ātman exists or not but whether in some way or other it is eternal.