The Buddha was a nontheist, not an atheist

Venerable Nyanaponika Thera (Buddhist Publication Society, BuddhaNet edition via accesstoinsight.org); edited and expanded by Dhr. Seven, Ashley Wells, Wisdom Quarterly

Buddhism and the God-Idea

Selected texts (bps.lk)

Quite contradictory views have been expressed in Western literature on the attitude of Buddhism toward the concept of God and gods (mono- and polytheism).

• The Buddha was not a theist.
  
• The Buddha was not an atheist. (It's a mistake and an oversimplification to lump him as one for some of the things he said, explained, or taught. Just as there are living beings, there are "gods" in the sense of devas, brahma, great brahmas, and light beings of the fine material, and incorporeal beings of the immaterial planes).
• The Buddha was certainly not agnostic.
• In a conventional sense one might regard him as a polytheist, but in an ultimate sense this would also be incorrect.
• He was a nontheist, a peculiar teaching that says that it does not matter to one's own awakening/enlightenment if there is or is not a "God" or "gods." Such beings are caught in the Wheel of Rebirth (samsara) and do not know Freedom (nirvana) any better than lower beings cycling through rebirths. The highborn will fall; the lowborn will rise; and the revolving goes on and on endlessly. But nirvana is an end of the suffering. Nirvana is not a rebirth, not a heaven, not nothingness (as many logical thinkers wrongly conclude), not anything that can be conceived and expressed in words, but it can be experienced.
• We live in a conditioned world (where all things that exist depend on conditions for their existence), whereas nirvana alone is called the "unconditioned element," as it does not depend on any conditions for its existence. It exists and is free of the Three Marks of All Conditioned Existence (which is that they are impermanent, unsatisfactory, and impersonal).
• The Buddha rejected the existence of an ultimate "creator God" who made everything, or brought beings/souls into existence, or originally brought the world into existence, or is controlling the universe or vast world.
• The human plane (manussya loka), where we are, is much larger than this planet. We live in a 10,000-fold world system (cakkavala), and there are countless such systems. A miniscule part of it is the "human plane."
• The whole world (loka) is incomprehensibly vast.
• There are 31 Planes of Existence, in general, with countless worlds on each plane. In fact, there are more than 31, but for simplicity's sake, the Buddha again and again referred to these 31 general categories. Why others got left off the list is not clear. For instance, what about the "interstitial hell" between universes? What about the "hell of laughter"? What about worlds that only come into existence when there is a Buddha teaching (such as the Pure Abodes), which otherwise do not exist as they would be filled by no one? What about a particular deva or peta world brought about by one's powerful personal karma (like that mango pond from the transfer of merit of donating to the noble community or arya-sangha), an act that can rarely be repeated?
• Most of the planes of existence the Buddha described are deva worlds, celestial heavens, but most living would seem to be crammed into lower unfortunate realms, such as the super-diversified animal plane, ghost realm, and hells, none of which are eternal but tend to last so long as to be considered "eternal" for all practical purposes, given that beings repeatedly fall back in to the downward path once they slip in and hardly ever make it out again until the world comes to an end, goes into chaos, and forms again as a new maha-kalpa or "great-aeon."

There is a path to wisdom.

From a study of the sutras or discourses of the Buddha preserved in the ancient Pali language canon, it will be seen that the idea of a personal deity, a "creator god" conceived to be eternal and omnipotent, is -- in the ultimate sense -- incompatible with the Buddha's Teachings.

On the other hand, conceptions of an impersonal godhead (Brahman or GOD) of any description, such as world-soul, and so on, are excluded by the Buddha's teachings on non-self or unsubstantiality (anatta).

Universe is big, multiverse is much bigger.

In Buddhist literature, the belief in a creator god (issara-nimmana-vada) is frequently mentioned and rejected, along with other causes wrongly brought up to explain the origin of the world -- for instance, a world-soul, time, nature, and so on.

God-belief, however, is placed in the same category as those morally destructive wrong views that deny the karmic results of deeds, assume a fortuitous origin of humans and nature, or teach absolute determinism.

These wrong views are said to be altogether pernicious, having definite bad results due to their effect on our ethical conduct here and now.

Theism, however, is regarded as a good kind of karma-teaching, insofar as it upholds the moral efficacy of deeds. So a theist (a believer in GOD, God, or Gods) who leads a moral and ethical life may, like anyone else doing so, expect a favorable rebirth -- in any of the many heavens or on the human plane.

One may possibly even be reborn in a celestial heavenly world that resembles one's own conception of it, though it cannot be of eternal duration as one may have expected. It can, nevertheless, be so long as to seem like an eternity while not actually being one.

In this illusion, karma, rebirth, and suffering are real.

If, however, fanaticism induces one to persecute those who do not share one's beliefs, this will have grave consequences for one's future destiny.

For fanatical attitudes, intolerance, and violence against others create unwholesome karma, leading to moral degeneration and to unhappy rebirths.

Although belief in God does not exclude a favorable rebirth, it is a variety of the wrong view called Eternalism, a false affirmation of permanence rooted in the craving for eternal existence. As such, it is an obstacle to final libertion from rebirth and suffering.

Among the fetters (samyojana) binding to one to continued rebirth, theism is particularly subject to those of personality-belief, attachment to rites and rituals, and craving for fine-material existence or for a "heaven of the sense sphere," as the case may be.

Buddhism is NOT a form of Hinduism, Brahmanism, or Vedanta. The Buddha rejected these.

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As an attempt at explaining the universe, its origin, and the human situation in this world, the God-idea was found entirely unconvincing by the Buddhist thinkers of old.

Through the centuries, Buddhist philosophers have formulated detailed arguments refuting the doctrine of a "creator god." It should be of interest to compare these with the ways in which Western philosophers have refuted the theological proofs of the existence of God.

But for an earnest believer, the God-idea is more than a mere device for explaining external facts like the origin of the world.

For that person it is an object of faith that can bestow a strong feeling of certainty, not only as to God's existence "somewhere out there," but as to God's consoling presence and closeness.

This feeling of certainty requires close scrutiny. Such scrutiny will reveal that in most cases the God-idea is only the devotee's projection of an ideal — generally a noble one — and of a fervent wish and deeply felt need to believe.

These projections are largely conditioned by external influences, such as childhood training, early impressions, religious education, tradition, and social environment (the society we are born into).

Charged with a very strong emotional emphasis, brought to life by our powerful human capacity for image-formation, visualization, and the creation of myth, they then come to be identified with the images and concepts of whatever religion the devotee is told to or chooses to follow.

In the case of many of the most sincere believers, a searching analysis would show that their "God-experience" has no more specific content than this.

Yet the range and significance of God-belief and God-experience are not fully exhausted by the preceding remarks.

The Truth is much stranger than fiction.

The lives and writings of the mystics of all great religions bear witness to religious experiences of great intensity, in which considerable changes are affected in the quality and scope of consciousness thereafter.

Profound absorption in meditation or prayer can bring about a deepening and widening, a brightening and intensifying of consciousness, accompanied by a transporting feeling of rapture and unparalleled bliss.

The contrast between these expanded states and normal conscious awareness is so great that the mystic believes this experience to be a manifestation of the divine. And given the contrast, this assumption is quite understandable.

Mystical experiences are also characterized by a marked reduction or temporary exclusion of the multiplicity of sense-perceptions and restless thoughts, and this relative unification of mind is then interpreted as a union or communion with "the One God."

Trying to understand all of these deeply moving impressions and spontaneous interpretations will usually cause the mystic to identify or interpret through the lens of a particular theology.

It is interesting to note, however, that the attempts of most great Western mystics to relate their mystical experiences to the official dogmas of their respective churches often resulted in teachings that were often looked upon askance by the orthodox, if not considered downright heretical. More