Bhikkhu Bodhi (Buddhist Publication Society, BPS.lk); Dhr. Seven (ed.), Wisdom Quarterly
Newcomers to Buddhism are invariably impressed by the clarity, directness, and earthy
practicality of the Dharma (Pali Dhamma) as embodied in such basic teachings as the
- Four Noble Truths
- Noble Eightfold Path
- Threefold Training.
However, when new
Dharma students encounter the doctrine of rebirth, they often feel it just doesn’t make sense.
At this point, they suspect, the Teaching has swerved off course, floundering in pointless
speculation and fantasy.
Even modern interpreters of Buddhism seem to have trouble taking
the rebirth teachings seriously. Some dismiss it out of hand as mere cultural baggage, “ancient
Indian metaphysics,” that the Buddha retained in deference to the worldview of his age.
Others
interpret rebirth as a metaphor for changing mental states, with the many realms of rebirth (within the 31 Planes of Existence) seen as
symbols for different moods and emotions.
A few critics have even questioned the very
authenticity of the texts on rebirth, arguing that they must be interpolations inserted sometimes after the Buddha.
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We find,
for example, that the Buddha explains his own enlightenment as the realization of the Three
Higher Knowledges — the first two involving direct cognition of other lives — and also instructs
his disciples on how to attain these knowledges directly for themselves.
When the texts speak about rebirth
into the five realms — the hells, the animal world, the ghost realm, the human world, and the
heavens of the devas — they never hint that these terms are intended symbolically.
On the contrary, they even
say that rebirth occurs “with the breakup of the body, after death,” which clearly implies they
mean the idea of rebirth to be taken quite literally. But this essay is not an attempt to argue for rebirth. More
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