Malcolm Pollack quotes, with apparent approval, the Buddha:
Just as a monkey roaming through the forest grabs hold of one branch, lets that go and grabs another, then lets that go and grabs still another, so too that which is called ‘mind’ and ‘mentality’ and ‘consciousness’ arises as one thing and ceases as another by day and by night. (Connected Discourses of the Buddha, p. 595)
But why is that passage more worthy of our credence than the following utterance of the Sage of the Superstitions:
Just as a monkey roaming through the forest grabs hold of one branch, lets that go and grabs another, then lets that go and grabs still another, all the while remaining numerically one and the same monkey, despite changes of posture and position, so too that which is called 'mind,' O monks, remains numerically one and the same mind through the manifold of mental change.
Related Posts (on one page):
- Can the Chariot Take Us to the Land of No Self?
- Of Monkeys and Minds and Identity Through Time
Worthy of a new post, which shall be forthcoming.
Would the Buddha allow for separate "grabs" (acts of consciousness) without a being that grabs (the monkey, the "I"). It is easy enough to see how the former are fragmentary and fleeting, but not how there can be thoughts without a thinker or that the thinker IS the thoughts. "Unity of apperception' and all that ....
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Bob: Isn't the phrase facon de parler (with appropriate diacritical mark)?
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