If so then the following passage"

"'Just so, great king, has the Blessed One passed away by that kind of passing away in which no root remains for the formation of another individual. The Blessed One has come to an end, and it cannot be pointed out of him, that he is here or there. But in the body of his doctrine he can, O king, be pointed out. For the doctrine 2 was preached by the Blessed One?' "

says that the soul of Buddha has disappeared. That does not mean the the soul of ordinary men has disappeared. Here I am using the word soul in place of 'root'. Call it what you may, for us ordinary people destined for rebirth, there must be a 'root' or a 'soul' that is reborn. You might suggest that the root is the individuals karma and that the Buddha no longer had any karma, so there was no root or soul. Fine. But do not deny the existence of a root that passes from lifetime to lifetime just because in Buddhism the claim is that there is no soul. You have just renamed it. I think it was trenamed so as to disparage other religions that use the language of the soul.

Harvey elsewhere yesterday points out the importance of language. Once you translate the languages of religion, they all say pretty much the same thing. You have previously said that Buddhist scholars via meditation went searching for the soul, (or was it the Buddha himself}, but could not find it- and therefore the soul cannot exist.

My question to you is, "Did they (or he) find the root?"

Wanda

• There is no eternal/unchanging self(soul), What does this mean? - bodhi - May 3, 2004 - 08:10 UTC
  • Souls evolve- What about the root? - wandaqueen - May 4, 2004 - 12:48 UTC
    • Richard??? - yanniru - May 7, 2004 - 03:08 UTC
    • Karma - bodhi - May 18, 2004 - 02:07 UTC
      • The root is no different from the soul - secretary - May 29, 2004 - 11:53 UTC