work in progress
Well-Known Member
Okay, but from the looks of it, it's going to take me awhile to get through!Depends. Not always.
Advaita Vedānta says that the ātman is Brahman in totality, not just a portion.
It may be worth looking at this: http://www.religiousforums.com/forum/vedanta-dir/111000-what-atman.html
No, and I believe the original source was a book on comparative religion, so I didn't expect it to be a nuanced explanation, especially considering the problems with translation of these concepts into English.Also, who told you that? Were they Hindu?
Okay, but that would tell me what the self isn't, rather than what it is.The Self is beyond identification with any phenomena. To equate it with thought, feeling, perception, consciousness, or the body are incorrect identifications.
Okay, but you're still going to lose me when you get to the part about transferring memories and self-conscious identity through reincarnation.I think it's fair to say that some interpret the ātman as being the ability that allows for sapience and consciousness in the first place - or that they are symptoms of the existence of the ātman in the first place.
Consciousness and memories =/= ātman.
I haven't gotten around to it yet, but my first, unsophisticated objection I have to a concept like reincarnation is that we are no longer living on a world with a steady level of population. World population exceeded one billion for the first time a little over 150 years ago, and has been soaring upward ever since. So, where have the extra atman's come from?