A note on Alagadauppama Suttanta

So  much  has  been  written about  the  Buddhist  view  of  attā  that  it  may  be  thought
unnecessary for anything further to be written about it. Nevertheless, although  a number
of  scholars  have  commented  upon  the  Alagaddūpama—sutta(=AS) ,  it  seems  to  have
escaped the notice of them that in that sutta the Buddha makes certain comments about
attā  in  the  context  of  a  refutation  of  particular  non-Buddhist  philosophical  doctrine.  It
seems worthwhile discussing these comments in detail, and considering whether they are
applicable to the other contexts in which  attā  occurs in the Pāli  canon.  Such a discussion
may be of help to those who still find difficulty with the Buddhist interpretation of attā.
In the AS the Buddha states that there are six diṭṭhiṭṭhānāni. The first of these is when
an untrained person says when regarding  rūpa: etaṃ mama, eso ‘ham asmi, eso me attā,
‘That  is  mine,  I  am  that,  that  is  my  attā’.
The  second  is  when  he  says  the  same  thing
about  vedanā;  the  third,  about  saññā;  the  fourth,  about  saṃkhārā;  the  fifth,  about
whatever. is  diṭṭha suta muta viññāta patta pariyesita anuvicarita manasā;  the sixth is
when  he  regards  the  view  so  loko  so  attā,  so  pecca  bhavissāmi  nicco  dhuvo  sassato
avipariṇāmadhammo sassatisamaṃ  tath’ eva  ṭhassāmi,  ‘The world and  the  attā  are  the
same;  having  passed  away  I  shall  be  eternal,  fixed,  everlasting,  of  an  unchangeable
nature; I shall remain for ever exactly so’ as etaṃ mama, eso ‘ham asmi, esa me attā.
Here then we have six wrong views, this being the usual meaning of diṭṭhi. It is wrong
to  look  at  material  form,  feelings,  perceptions,  mental  formations,  sensory  perceptions
(elsewhere this  group of five khandhas has the word viññāṇa  in place of the list of words
given above), and the last mentioned view with the thought ‘That is mine, I am that, that
is my attā’.
To take the last view first. The idea that the world and the ātman  (=brahman)  are the
same  is  found  in  the  Upaniṣads,  and  it  is  possible  to  find  actual  verbal  echoes  of  the
Upaniṣads in this passage,
e.g. eṣa ma ātmā  (Chānd. Up. III. 14. 3 –  4), and yathākratur
asmiml  loke  puruṣo  bhavati  tathetaḥ  pretya  bhavati,  sa  kratuṃ  kurvīta…  etam  itaḥ
pretyābhisambhavitāsmīti (ibid. III 14. 1 and 4).
In contrast to this false view the Buddha states that some one  who is cognisant with
the  ariya-dhamma  looks at  rūpa  etc.  with the thought:  na etaṃ  mama n’ eso ‘ham asmi,
na m’ eso attā’

‘That is  not mine, I am not that, that is not my  attā’ Consequently he is
not anxious about something which does not exist.
The Buddha’s audience ask if it is possible to be anxious about something which does
not exist externally.  The Buddha points out that it would  be possible for someone to be
anxious  about  an  external  object  which  he  once  possessed  but  which  now  no  longer
existed. He is then asked whether there might be no anxiety about something which did
not exist externally.  The answer is ‘Yes’.  The third question is whether there might be
anxiety about something which does not exist internally. The Buddha quotes the case of a
man who holds the view that the world and the  attā  are the same, and that after passing
away  he  will  become  eternal,  fixed,  etc.  He  hears  the  dhamma  which  is  taught  for  the
destruction of such wrong views,  and thinks, ‘I shall surely be annihilated, I shall surely
be  destroyed  I  shall  surely  not  be  in  the  future’  (ucchijjissāmi  nāma  su,  vinassissāmi
nāma su, na su nāma bhavissāmi) His grief for this is grief for something which does not
exist  internally.  Someone  who  does  not  hold  this  view  does  not  think  that  he  will  be
annihilated  when  he  hears  the  Buddha’s  doctrine,  and  therefore  does  not  grieve  for
something which does not exist internally.
The  Buddha  then  continues:  ‘You  might  obtain  a  possession  which,  being  eternal,
fixed, etc., might last for ever. Can you see that possession which, being eternal,  fixed,
etc., might last for ever?’ The audience agree with the Buddha that they cannot see such a
possession.  He  says:  ‘You  might  embrace  a  view  of  the  doctrine  of  attā,  for  whose
embracers  grief  etc., would not arise. Can  you  see such a view?’ They  agree that they
cannot.  ‘You  might,  depend  upon  a  view  where  grief  etc.  that  does  not  arise  for  those
who  depend  upon  it.  Can  you  see  such  a  view?’  Again  they  agree  that  they  cannot.
The  Buddha  has  therefore  suggested,  and  his  audience  has  agreed,  that  there  is  no
possession which would last for ever, nor is there any doctrine of  attā  nor dependence
upon a view which does not bring grief to those who hold it. No proof of  this is offered,
and  the  statement  seems  to  be  purely  empirical.  Neither  the  Buddha  nor  his  audience
have  seen  anything  which  is  eternal,  nor  they  have  seen  a  doctrine  which  frees  an  a
adherent from grief. They have, therefore, agreed that everything is  anicca  and  dukhha,
and  nothing  is  nicca  and  sukha.  We  shall  see  the  importance  of  this  below.
The Buddha then goes on to consider  attā. He states: ‘If  attā  existed, could there be
the view “I possess something belonging to  attā”  (attani vā sati, attaniyam me  ti  assa)’
They agree. He continues: ‘If something belonging to attā existed, would it be possible to
have the view “I possess  attā”  (attaniye sati,    attā  me ti assa)?’ They agree. He asks; ‘If
attā  and  something  belonging  to  attā  really  and  truly  cannot  be  found,  then  is  not  the
view that the world and the  attā  are the same, and that after passing away one will be
eternal..., entirely the view of a fool ?’ ‘How can it be otherwise?’
The Buddha then proceeds with his proof. He asks: ‘Is material form eternal or noneternal?’ His audience state that it is non-eternal, presumably basing their answer on their
experience of life, where  material form all around them decays. ‘But’, says the Buddha,
‘is  what  is  non-enternal  dukkha  or  sukha?’  The  answer  is  dukkha,  again  presumably
based upon experience of life. The Buddha concludes: ‘What is impermanent and dukkha
and subject to change, is  it right to look at that and say, ‘That is mine, I am that, that is
my attā?’ The answer is ‘No.’
It  is  important  to  note  that  this  answer  can  only  be  given  by  those  who  know,  in
advance, that the term attā is by definition nicca and sukha, and therefore anything which
is  anicca  and  dukkha  cannot be  attā. This gives us a clear indication of the type of  attā
which is being discussed. It is the Upaniṣadic idea of an ātman which is nitya and sukha,
and  this  is  in  complete  agreement  with  the  fact,  noted  above,  that  some  of  the
phraseology of the non-Buddhist view which is being rejected has Upaniṣadic echoes. It
seems  undeniable  that  the  Buddha’s  audience  were  aware  of  the  Upaniṣadic  view,  and
realized that it could be refuted simply by pointing out that the world around us, which
consists of material form, etc., is obviously non-eternal and  dukkha,  and not eternal and
sukha,  as would be essential if the doctrine that the world and the  attā  are the same were
correct.
The Buddha then asks his audience the same  question about being  anicca  or  nicca,
and  sukha  or  dukkha,  of  vedanā,  saññā,  saṃkhārā,  and  finally  viññāṇa  (which  here
replaces the list of sense impressions given above), i.e. the five khandhas. He sums up by
stating that the khandhas are properly to be regarded as ‘that is not mine, I am not that,
that is not my  attā.’ He tells his audience that an  ariya-sāvaka who sees this is freed, and
becomes vimutta-citta, i.e. he is a Tathāgata.
The  Buddha  then  exhorts.  his  audience  to  abandon  what  is  ‘not  yours’  (yaṃ  na
tumhākaṃ  taṃ  pajahatha).  In  answer  to  his  own  question  ‘what  is  not  yours?’,  he
explains that those things which he had already  spoken of as being ‘not mine’, i.e. the
five khandhas, were not theirs. That is to say that he is rephrasing his earlier  statement
that rūpa, etc, were (from their point of view) not ‘mine’.
As a final proof of the fact that the khandhas are not their attā, i. e. a final refutation
of the view that the external world and the khandhas and the  attā  are the same around
thing, he points to the wood being collected and burned them in the Jetavana, where the
discussion is taking place, and he asks his audience if they think, when people do this,
that they are carrying them (his audience) away and burning them. The answer is ‘No’,
and the reason is that they do not have  attā  or anything belonging to  attā  in them. The
Buddha  closes  by  saying  that  they  are  to  abandon  everything  which  is  not  theirs,  and
what is not theirs is rūpa, etc.
We are now in a position to assess the basis of the Buddha’s refutation. The doctrine
that the world and the  attā  are the same  (so loko so  attā) also affirms the oneness of the
individual  attā  and the world-attā. The phrase  eso ‘ham asmi  ‘I am that’ is the  tat  tvam
asi  ‘Thou art that’ of the Upaniṣads looked at from the point of view of the first person
instead of the second person. Since  loko=attā, then the Buddha’s argument is: ‘If there is
world-attā, then there is something belonging to world-attā  in me. If there is something
belonging to world-attā  in me, i.e. if there is a world-attā, then I (and all other things)
would have attā  which is part of the world-attā, and I would have all the “things” that go
to make up world-attā. Material form  (rūpa),  etc., would be “mine”.  If, however, each
individual attā were part of the world-attā, then each painful sensation felt by one part of
the  world-attā  would  be  felt  by  every  other  part  of  the  world-attā,  i.e.  when  wood  is
burned the  attā  in us would feel the pain suffered by the  attā  in it. We do not feel any
such pain because there is no world-attā’.
E.  J.  Thomas  seems  to  have  overlooked  this  reference  to  the  world-attā  when  he
wrote: ‘The Vedic religion had developed on the philosophical side into the doctrine of
the soul (ātman) as an ultimate reality, either as the one universal soul, or as an infinity of
souls involved in matter. Buddhism appears to know only this second form...., and this it
denied by  asserting that there was nothing behind the physical and mental elements that
constitute the empirical individual’
. Richard Gombrich, in his review of Bhattacharya’s
book  L’Ātman-Brahman  dans  le  Bouddhisme  Ancien,  states
that  ‘in  his  voluminous sermons [the Buddha] never mentions the world soul, either under one of its Upaniṣadic names or under any other’, but as Choudhury stated, ‘The meaning [in AS] is not clear if
the word is not used as universal Self’.

It  is  interesting  at  this  point  to  indicate  a  close  parallel  to  the  rejection  of  the
Upaniṣadic  view  in  a  Jain  text.  We  find  in  Sūyagaḍaṃga  I.1.1.  the  following  pair  of
verses:jahā ya puḍhavī-thūbhe ege nāṇāhi dīsai
evam bho kasiṇe loe vinnū nāṇāhi dīsai.
 evam ege tti jappanti mandā ārambha-nissiyā
ege kiccā sayaṃ tivvaṃ dukkhaṃ niyacchai.
‘And as the mass of earth, with all its manifold nature, is seen as one, so the whole world,
with all its manifold  nature, is seen as the intelligent principle. Some fools, intent upon
their (bad) activities, say that it is so with the individual. (But) the individual who does an
evil deed goes himself to a harsh misery’.
The Cties upon  Sūyagaḍaṃga  call this view  ekātmādvaita  and  ātmādvaitavāda,  and
Jacobi explains
: ‘If there were but one  ātman  common to all men, the fruit of works
done by one man might accrue to another. For the  ātman  is the substratum of merit and
demerit’.  Although  it  is  expressed  somewhat  succinctly,  it  is  clear  that  the  last  line  is
intended as a refutation of the idea set out in the first verse  –  that there is a world-ātman
(vinnū=ātman)  which appears in different forms. The refutation follows the line that if
this were so then every one who partook of the wor1d-ātman would be jointly responsible
for  any  evil  committed  by  any  other  portion  of  the  world-ātman,  i.e.  any  other
‘individual’. Our experience of the world, in which we see individuals being punished or
rewarded for demerit or merit performed earlier, proves that this is not so.
Not  only  is  it  of  interest  to  find  Buddhist  and  Jain  text  giving  a  similar  argument
when rejecting the  ātman  theory, but it is also helpful as  a means of  assessing  exactly
what  sort  of  ātman  the  Buddha  was  rejecting  in  the  AS.  The  Jains  differ  from  the
Buddhists in that they do believe in a personal  ātman,  although not an unchanging one.
The  ātman  being rejected in the  Sūyagaḍaṃga  is therefore the world-ātman. The close
similarity of the two arguments makes it clear that the Buddha in the AS is not merely
refuting  the  individual  ātman,  but  also  the  concept  of  the  world-ātman.
It is noteworthy that the argument used by the Buddha in the AS to refute the idea of
a world-attā  form part of the proof put forward in the Anattalakkhaṇasutta,”  traditionally
the second sermon he preached after the enlightenment, to show that the five khandhas
are  anattā  ‘non-attā’.
In that sermon he states: ‘Material form  (rūpa)  is non-attā, for if
it  were  attā  then  it  would  not  be  conducive  to  disease  and  we  should  have  complete
mastery over it’. Similarly for the other khandhas. He continues: ‘Is rūpa  eternal or noneternal?  Is  something  which  is  non-eternal  pleasant  or  unpleasant?  Is  it  right  to  regard
something which is non-eternal, unpleasant and subject to change as “That is mine, I am
that, that is my attā”?’
As  in  the  AS,  the  Buddha’s  ability  to  reject  the  idea  that  the  khandhas  are  attā
depends upon his audience knowing that attā is, by definition, nicca and sukha. If it were,
then we should not suffer disease (which is  dukkha),  and if the  rūpa,  etc., were  attā  then
it  would  be  ‘ours’  and  we  should  have  full  control  over  it.  All  this  proves  that  the
khandhas are not attā, they are anattā ‘non-attā’.
The same argument that something is  anattā  because it is non-eternal is also seen in
the Chachakka-sutta, where the Buddha states:  ‘If anyone should say that eye, etc., is
attā, then that is not fitting, for the coming into existence of eye, and its passing away, is
seen. Since it is  not fitting  to say of something whose coming into existence and passing
away is seen “My attā comes into existence and passes away”, therefore eye is non-attā’.
Buddhaghosa points out that the Buddha proves the fact of non-attā  in three ways:
sometimes  by  showing  that  something  is  non-eternal;  sometimes  by  showing  that  it  is
dukkha; and sometimes by both. So in the  Anattalakkhaṇia sutta he shows that  rūpa  etc.
are  dukkha;  in  the  Chachakka  sutta  by  showing  that  eye,  etc.,  are  anicca;  in  the
Arahanta-sutta he  shows  that  rūpa,  etc.,  are  both:  rūpaṃ,  bhikkhave,  aniccaṃ;  yad
aniccaṃ taṃ dukkhaṃ; yam dukkhaṃ tad anattā. yad anattā, taṃ n’ etaṃ mama n’ eso
‘ham  asmi  na  m’  eso  attā.  The  same  argument  is  set  out  in  its  simplest  form  in  the
Paṭisambhidāmagga:  yaṃ  aniccaṃ,  taṃ  dukkhaṃ:  yaṃ  aniccañ  ca  dukkhañ  ca,  taṃ
anattā.
As  is  well  known,  the  three  terms  anicca,  dukkha,  and  anattā  also  occur  in  the  tilakkhaṇa formula:
sabbe saṃkhārā aniccā,
sabbe saṃkhārā dukkhā,
sabbe dhammā anattā.

‘All compounded things are non-eternal, all compounded things are unpleasant, all things
are non-attā’. In a truncated form this occurs as  sabbe saṃkhārā aniccā, sabbe dhammā
anattā.

Our  previous  conclusions  enable  us  to  see  that  the  third  phrase  of  the  formula  is  a
conclusion which arises from the first two phrases: ‘Because all compounded things are
non-eternal  and  unpleasant,  therefore  all  things  are  non-attā’.  The  difference  between
saṃkhārā  and  dhammā  in  this  context  has  been  well  explained  by  Nyanatiloka:

‘[saṅkhāra]  in the sense of anything formed  (=saṅkhata),  or created, includes all things
whatever in the world, all phenomena of existence. It is, however subordinate to the still
wider  and  all-embracing  term  ‘dhamma’  (thing),  for  dhamma  includes  even  the
Unoriginated  (‘Nibbāna’).’  So  dhamma  includes  all  the  saṅkhata  things  (=saṃkhārā)
which are  anicca  and  dukkha,  and also the  asaṅkhata  thing  (=nibbāna)  which is  nicca
and sukha. All these are non-attā. The distinction between the two is made in the Vinaya:
aniccā  sabbe  saṃkhārā  dukkhānattā  ca  saṃkhatā,  nibbānañ  c’  eva  paññatti  anattā  iti
nicchayā,

‘Impermanent  are  all  constructs  painful,  not  self,  and  constructed,  and
certainly nibbāna is a description meaning not-self’.

The saṃkhārā  are, of course,  anattā as is made clear from such statements as  sabbasaṅkhāresu aniccaṃ anattā ti tilakkhaṇam āropetvā, but the possibility of adding the
asaṃkhata nibbāna to the saṃkhatā saṃkhārā arises because although nibbāna is neither
anicca nor dukkha, it is nevertheless anattā.

If there had been any other reference in the Pāli canon to the world -attā  besides the
one in the AS, we might have expected it to be with reference to the  saṃkhārā,  but even
when referring to these the Buddha’s followers seem to have regarded their anattā nature
from the ego-centric point of view, i.e. from the point of view of the individual  attā.  So
we  find  the  Buddha  stating  ayaṃ  kāyo  aniccato  dukkhato  …    parato  …  anattato
samanupassitabbo,

‘This  body  is  to  be  regarded  as  non-eternal,  as  unpIeasant,  …  as
other ... as non-self’. The Thera Mahāmoggallāna stated—
ye pañca khandhe passanti parato no ca attato;
ye ca passanti saṃkhāre parato no ca attato.

‘Who see the five khandhas as other not as self; and who see compounded things as other
not as self’.
The  commentary  upon  Mahāmoggallāna’s  verses  makes  it  clear  that  there  is  no
effective  difference  between  parato  and  anattato;  parato  ti  anattato,  tassa  attaggāhapaṭikkhepa-dassanaṃ h’ etaṃ.

These passages which include the word  parato  offer us
help in the problem of deciding how best to translate the word  attā. There seems to be no
other way of translating  parato  than ‘as other’, and we must therefore translate  attato  as
‘as  self’,  since  English  recognizes  the  opposition  between  ‘self’  and  ‘other’,  but  not
between ‘soul’ and ‘other’. If we have to translate attā as ‘self’ in these contexts, then for
the sake of consistency we must do the same elsewhere. To distinguish it from the normal
reflexive use of ‘self’ for  attā, which is, of course, widely used in  Pāli, we should rather
adopt the translation ‘permanent self’ for the individual  attā whose existence the Buddha
rejected.
As  E.  J.  Thomas  states, in  the  Anattalakkhaṇa-sutta  the  Buddha  does  not
specifically deny the existence of the  attā. The sutta is merely a denial that the khandhas
were  ātman,  whatever that term means. It may be true to say that the Buddha does not
specifically deny the existence of the attā anywhere in the Pāli canon, in the sense that he
does not state explicitly ‘The attā does not exist’. As stated above, however, in the AS he
does speak of the men who grieve over the loss of his  attā  as grieving about something
which  does  not  exist  internally.  He  also  draws  attention  to  the  folly  of  someone  who
holds the view that the world  and the  attā  are the same if it can be shown that  attā  and
some thing belonging to  attā  are not to be found, and he then  goes on to prove to the
satisfaction of his audience that they are not to be found. 

I  think  it  is  correct  to  conclude  that  by  implication,  if  not  explicitly,  the  Buddha
denied the existence of the permanent individual self.