No Inner Core: An Introduction to the Doctrine of Anatta - BuddhaNet

Vipassanà meditation, which allowed him to realize
the suffering, impermanent, and no-soul nature of all
things, and he later became an Arahant. Unfortunately,
this story is used by some scholars to try to prove that
Buddha did not really deny the existence of atta. 27
Let us now examine the ideas contained in the
term atta, Before Buddha appeared in this world,
Bràhmaõism, which was later to be called Hinduism,
prevailed in India. Bràhmaõism teaches the doctrine of
the existence of atta (in Sanskrit, àtman), which is usually
translated as soul or self. When Buddha appeared,
He claimed that there is no àtman. This doctrine was
so important that Buddha proclaimed it only five days
after His first sermon, the sermon on the Four Noble
Truths. The five disciples who heard that first sermon
became “streamwinners” (Sotàpannas) – persons who
have attained the first stage of enlightenment. Five
days later, Buddha assembled the five disciples and
taught them the anattà doctrine. By the end of that
Sutta, all five became Arahants, persons who have attained
the highest stage of enlightenment.
What is this atta which the Buddha negated? The
word anattà is a combination of two words: an (< na)
and atta. An means not or no, and atta is usually translated
as soul or self (sometimes with upper case ‘S’ to
signify a spiritual entity). But atta has a wide range of
meanings, which we will now examine. These terms
are discussed in two famous books of Hindu scripture,
the Upanishads 28 and the Bhagavad Gita 29 . Many
views of atta are found in the Buddhist Brahmajàla
Sutta 30 , which I will discuss later.
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