Skeptical Buddhism
@skepticalbuddhism.bsky.social
asks how well we've understood what the Buddha taught, as we see him in our oldest versions of his talks. By going back to those ancient texts, and studying the culture of his time, can we get a more accurate sense of it? An iconoclastic Secular Buddhism.
I don't think I'd introduce it as "a short exercise" though, since both listening to the instructions and taking the time to work on visualizations or other variations on experiencing the connections would take time, and I assume the "x2" means "do this twice" for each variation.
December 12, 2025 at 8:20 PM
I don't think I'd introduce it as "a short exercise" though, since both listening to the instructions and taking the time to work on visualizations or other variations on experiencing the connections would take time, and I assume the "x2" means "do this twice" for each variation.
Read through, not listened to.
Nice variation on the theme of Metta. I'm not someone much triggered by past memories or the like so I'm not helpful in judging how free of triggering it is, but I appreciate the thoroughness of the guidance on building connection and recognizing emotion.
Nice variation on the theme of Metta. I'm not someone much triggered by past memories or the like so I'm not helpful in judging how free of triggering it is, but I appreciate the thoroughness of the guidance on building connection and recognizing emotion.
December 12, 2025 at 8:20 PM
Read through, not listened to.
Nice variation on the theme of Metta. I'm not someone much triggered by past memories or the like so I'm not helpful in judging how free of triggering it is, but I appreciate the thoroughness of the guidance on building connection and recognizing emotion.
Nice variation on the theme of Metta. I'm not someone much triggered by past memories or the like so I'm not helpful in judging how free of triggering it is, but I appreciate the thoroughness of the guidance on building connection and recognizing emotion.
26/ More to say on the subject but I'm off to have an early Thanksgiving Dinner with family. Next week we'll talk about the last link, aging-and-death. Hope your holiday brings you peace and joy.
December 1, 2025 at 6:49 AM
26/ More to say on the subject but I'm off to have an early Thanksgiving Dinner with family. Next week we'll talk about the last link, aging-and-death. Hope your holiday brings you peace and joy.
25/ So he can't say, "Well, there is a self, it's just that it's not separate, not eternal, not changeless. It's contingent, impermanent, and always changing." So he just doesn't give it a name. But I do: I say it is *anattā* -- it is what is *not* the separate, eternal, changeless self.
December 1, 2025 at 6:49 AM
25/ So he can't say, "Well, there is a self, it's just that it's not separate, not eternal, not changeless. It's contingent, impermanent, and always changing." So he just doesn't give it a name. But I do: I say it is *anattā* -- it is what is *not* the separate, eternal, changeless self.
24/ We hear echoes of this problem of language in his attempts to straighten out confused listeners who can't quite understand him saying that what they believe is *ātman* is not. "He's destroying the *ātman*!" they say.
December 1, 2025 at 6:49 AM
24/ We hear echoes of this problem of language in his attempts to straighten out confused listeners who can't quite understand him saying that what they believe is *ātman* is not. "He's destroying the *ātman*!" they say.
23/ I suspect the reason he didn't give our ever-changing selves a name is because, in his culture, anything with a name had an eternal existence, its own slice of Brahman within it.
December 1, 2025 at 6:49 AM
23/ I suspect the reason he didn't give our ever-changing selves a name is because, in his culture, anything with a name had an eternal existence, its own slice of Brahman within it.
22/ In the suttas the Buddha never uses the word *anattā* to express what we mistake for a lasting (for some, "eternal") self. It's always used to point out what isn't *ātman*.
December 1, 2025 at 6:49 AM
22/ In the suttas the Buddha never uses the word *anattā* to express what we mistake for a lasting (for some, "eternal") self. It's always used to point out what isn't *ātman*.
21/ All the words used to express "beings" being born are suggestive of what we mistake for *ātman* coming into existence again and again and again, endlessly, with no recognizable beginning, and only one possible ending, which is the hoped-for result of following the eightfold path.
December 1, 2025 at 6:49 AM
21/ All the words used to express "beings" being born are suggestive of what we mistake for *ātman* coming into existence again and again and again, endlessly, with no recognizable beginning, and only one possible ending, which is the hoped-for result of following the eightfold path.
20/ As I said in #16 above, I agree the Buddha's description of birth (*jāti*) here is meant to read as literal because it's being clear in expressing that top-level pattern, but by this point in the lesson it's hoped we understand that's metaphorical.
December 1, 2025 at 6:49 AM
20/ As I said in #16 above, I agree the Buddha's description of birth (*jāti*) here is meant to read as literal because it's being clear in expressing that top-level pattern, but by this point in the lesson it's hoped we understand that's metaphorical.
19/ But it isn't that world, as the next link will tell us (next thread).
December 1, 2025 at 6:49 AM
19/ But it isn't that world, as the next link will tell us (next thread).
18/ At the level of his meaning, though, DA discusses the origin of what we mistake for *ātman*, & the rituals we perform to create and modify that not-self (*anattā*), & in this final "Results" section, that not-self arising in a world that looks to it like the world it has believed in all along.
December 1, 2025 at 6:49 AM
18/ At the level of his meaning, though, DA discusses the origin of what we mistake for *ātman*, & the rituals we perform to create and modify that not-self (*anattā*), & in this final "Results" section, that not-self arising in a world that looks to it like the world it has believed in all along.
17/ At that level he's saying, "What I am talking about is *like* this; but it's not exactly that." That's the way the teachers before him taught; the method the Vedas used to introduce new ideas.
December 1, 2025 at 6:49 AM
17/ At that level he's saying, "What I am talking about is *like* this; but it's not exactly that." That's the way the teachers before him taught; the method the Vedas used to introduce new ideas.
16/ I read it as saying exactly that, but not only that. It *is* talking about literal rebirth after death because at the top level of the Buddha's lesson of DA, he has three sections: first about the origin of the *ātman*, then the middle about rituals modifying it, then what happens after death.
December 1, 2025 at 6:49 AM
16/ I read it as saying exactly that, but not only that. It *is* talking about literal rebirth after death because at the top level of the Buddha's lesson of DA, he has three sections: first about the origin of the *ātman*, then the middle about rituals modifying it, then what happens after death.
15/ Not that any of that in any way denies a traditional interpretation of what the Buddha is saying in DA. If he was describing literal rebirth, he would (I think we'd all agree) be describing a self that is reborn that is transient, changeable, not eternal.
December 1, 2025 at 6:49 AM
15/ Not that any of that in any way denies a traditional interpretation of what the Buddha is saying in DA. If he was describing literal rebirth, he would (I think we'd all agree) be describing a self that is reborn that is transient, changeable, not eternal.
14/ The compound for "manifestation" -- *pātubhāvo* -- shares its base word *bhāvo* with becoming's *bhava* since both have the Vedic root *bhu*. There's a repeated theme of bringing up what's transient.
December 1, 2025 at 6:49 AM
14/ The compound for "manifestation" -- *pātubhāvo* -- shares its base word *bhāvo* with becoming's *bhava* since both have the Vedic root *bhu*. There's a repeated theme of bringing up what's transient.
13/ Other notable words he chose include the "manifestation of the aggregates" which the Buddha frequently tells us are "not self" though they're mistaken for the *ātman*. Are we to realize he is talking about what is "not self" arising?
December 1, 2025 at 6:49 AM
13/ Other notable words he chose include the "manifestation of the aggregates" which the Buddha frequently tells us are "not self" though they're mistaken for the *ātman*. Are we to realize he is talking about what is "not self" arising?
12/ opens the possibility of what we can see -- if we are mindfully looking -- a life of change.
December 1, 2025 at 6:49 AM
12/ opens the possibility of what we can see -- if we are mindfully looking -- a life of change.
11/ So "being" is not just a good, but a great translation, since it captures the way *jāti* arises from *bhava*'s "becoming" as well as, perhaps, conveying what the Buddha is subtly saying: that the being that arises is not existing in the sense of "fixed, permanent, changeless" but instead
December 1, 2025 at 6:49 AM
11/ So "being" is not just a good, but a great translation, since it captures the way *jāti* arises from *bhava*'s "becoming" as well as, perhaps, conveying what the Buddha is subtly saying: that the being that arises is not existing in the sense of "fixed, permanent, changeless" but instead
10/ We can see that *satta*'s second definition is that it's a "a living being, creature, a sentient & rational being, a person" and that it's drawn from the Vedic term *satva*. Pali-wise, its root is in *sant* which derives from *atthi* which means "being, existing".
December 1, 2025 at 6:49 AM
10/ We can see that *satta*'s second definition is that it's a "a living being, creature, a sentient & rational being, a person" and that it's drawn from the Vedic term *satva*. Pali-wise, its root is in *sant* which derives from *atthi* which means "being, existing".
9/ For example, *sattānaṃ* and *sattanikāye* where the *satta* (purple) is a word for a living being, and *nikāye* (light purple) is compounded with it, adding the sense of a "collection, class, or group" of such beings. Some images from the Digital Pali Reader, below, show translations.
December 1, 2025 at 6:49 AM
9/ For example, *sattānaṃ* and *sattanikāye* where the *satta* (purple) is a word for a living being, and *nikāye* (light purple) is compounded with it, adding the sense of a "collection, class, or group" of such beings. Some images from the Digital Pali Reader, below, show translations.
8/ Below is an image of how I go about looking at other authors' translations. In this case it's Bhikkhu Bodhi's translation of Sariputta's explanation of birth in MN 9, very similar to the Buddha's, above.
![quote from MN 9 translated by Bhikkhu Bodhi
At the top, the Pali language that was translated. Below, Bodhi's translation. The words being translated each have their own background color, which is matched to those words' translations.
“And what, bhikkhus, is birth? The birth of various beings into the various orders of beings, being born, descent [into the womb], production, the manifestation of the aggregates, the obtaining of the sense bases. This is called birth."](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:rwy7gautkkjh2u36ludhjfjm/bafkreifsmor5swv7epftvq7drfppktom5e5thovxtvc2a5e7uz7jllensi@jpeg)
December 1, 2025 at 6:49 AM
8/ Below is an image of how I go about looking at other authors' translations. In this case it's Bhikkhu Bodhi's translation of Sariputta's explanation of birth in MN 9, very similar to the Buddha's, above.
7/ But some of the word-choices the Buddha made are still interesting.
December 1, 2025 at 6:49 AM
7/ But some of the word-choices the Buddha made are still interesting.
6/ Nothing in it even limits the discussion to humans or even mammals, despite Bodhi's insertion of one possible connotation of the word meaning "descent" to include its occasional association with conception in a womb, though I note "descent into the womb" is not birth, but conception.
December 1, 2025 at 6:49 AM
6/ Nothing in it even limits the discussion to humans or even mammals, despite Bodhi's insertion of one possible connotation of the word meaning "descent" to include its occasional association with conception in a womb, though I note "descent into the womb" is not birth, but conception.
5/ Seen standing alone like that and so, taken literally, yes, it's about birth.
December 1, 2025 at 6:49 AM
5/ Seen standing alone like that and so, taken literally, yes, it's about birth.
4/ Unlike the descriptions found in the "Rituals" section, which focus on examples of what he is specifically pointing out (e.g. *taṇhā*'s craving as problematic views about who we are and what we should believe in) here he is clearly using then-common understandings of what birth is about.
December 1, 2025 at 6:49 AM
4/ Unlike the descriptions found in the "Rituals" section, which focus on examples of what he is specifically pointing out (e.g. *taṇhā*'s craving as problematic views about who we are and what we should believe in) here he is clearly using then-common understandings of what birth is about.