Spiny Norman wrote:cjmacie wrote:.
I put this question (as in the OP) to both Bhikkhu Bodhi and Thanissaro Bhikkhu in post-talk Q/A sessions over the last couple of years. Both replied, in effect, that craving is reborn.
Or is that craving
causes rebirth, and therefore suffering?
In the standard formula for dependent origination craving and clinging lead to becoming ( bhava ) in the 3 realms. From this it would seem that bhava is a cycle of birth and death, "powered" by craving and shaped by kamma.
http://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka ... .than.html
I'm not sure that anything is "reborn" though. It's like saying that the wind is "reborn".
Good points, Spiny. There is also the problem that if it is craving that is reborn, then we still cannot account for the personalised nature of that craving. If we are heirs to our kamma, etc., then who or what is associated with (owns? experiences?) the craving that is reborn? Just as I am not heir to anyone else's kamma, I don't inherit anyone else's craving.
Two other points, if I may, for anyone to pick up.
1) What here (i.e. in the terms of the OP) counts as "Classical Theravada"? I would have thought that there are so many different views expressed on rebirth (Abhidhamma, "three-life", "one-life", simultaneous, etc.) which could all count as Theravadan.
2) Is rebirth always held to occur against a conception of absolute time? (i.e. time that is universal and one-directional). In suttas, "past lives" are talked about as occurring in the historical past, occurring prior to the current life. Rebirth is taked about as occurring in the future. This is, of course, the only way that we can understand causality and conditioning, and suttas frequently divide time up into past, present, and future. Does this mean that time is absolute? That the Buddha merely talked as if it were? Is there any reason why our kamma could not cause us to be reborn in an age which we - in this life - would consider to be in the historical past?