What we sense as our being which is localized as our body is what the Buddha calls the satkaya, that is, the individual body (in Pali it is sometimes referred to as ‘own-body’). Satkaya is our physical body which we have had since birth. Satkaya is really the result of mind or spirit flowing into an enclosed bodily limit in which it is no longer unlimited and infinite.
As beings, we are only aware of the satkaya. We are not cognizant of the spirit as distinguished from the satkaya wherein spirit becomes time bound (samsara). As a result of this, we have become overly identified with satkaya. We simply have no capacity, as yet, to recognize spirit becoming a physical body.
Our relationship with satkaya would be much different if we recognized ourselves to be spirit or pure Mind energizing the satkaya instead of being the satkaya, itself. The way we are now, we are trapped. We are doomed, in other words, to follow the satkaya through its temporal phases.
Imagine, therefore, a state we might suddenly achieve by which, as spirit, we know and see how the body is energized. This would mean that the satkaya is an effect, i.e., something that is derived in which its source is wholly spiritual and prior. From this perspective, we are not the satkaya. We are the satkaya energizer.
According to the Buddha, it is the satkaya that we are confusing with the atman or our true self. When the Buddha is said to deny the self or atman he denies that the Five Aggregates constitute the self and that the satkaya is the true self. On the same token, to assert that the satkaya is the self is called wrong view.
The author is totally correct. The localized heap of bacteria that you call your body is nothing but a dung making machine. If your body is ultimately real, it certainly will NOT leave you! but no, it decays and dies, but you mistake your body as yourself. But that is a foolish nature of common human.
And as they say in Zen, if you know Truth, lay your head down and let it be chopped off. If you die after, to hell you will go:) Don't mess with Buddhism!
Bodhiratna
Posted by: Bodhiratna | May 17, 2008 at 11:09 PM
Well, I hope you're right about this; however, there's no proof, of course, that this is the case. It would just plain suck if all of our consciousness, hopes and dreams are merely a result of a physical brain, etc...
But other suppositions that just plain suck have proven to be true: lovely women prefer monsters and idiots, creeps tend to amass more power than compassionate beings, my, the list goes on and on....
As for what the Buddha said not to confuse with the atman, the fact that there's so much disagreement between Theravadins and other sects on this matter seems to indicate that the Buddha wasn't too clear on this matter. Or was he?
Posted by: Frank | May 16, 2008 at 08:12 PM