Note 66 — Chapter VII · THE THEORY OF NON-ATMAN OR NON-EGO.

Âtman is usually translated “life,” “ego,” or “soul,”[66] and is a technical term used both by Vedanta philosophers and Buddhists. But we have to note at the beginning that they do not use the term in the same sense. When the Vedanta philosophy, especially the later one, speaks of âtman as our inmost self which is identical with the universal Brahma, it is used in its most abstract metaphysical sense and does not mean the soul whatever, as the latter is commonly understood by vulgar minds. On the other hand, Buddhists understand by âtman this vulgar, materialistic conception of the soul (bhûtâtman) and positively denies its existence as such. If we, for convenience’ sake, distinguish between phenomenal and noumenal in our notion of ego or soul, the âtman of Buddhism is the phenomenal ego, namely, a concrete agent that is supposed to do the acting, thinking, and feeling; while the âtman of Vedantists is the noumenal ego as the raison d’être of our psychical life. The one is in fact material, however ethereal it might be conceived. The other is a highly metaphysical conception transcending the reach of human discursive knowledge. The latter may be identified with Paramâtman and the former with Jîvâtman. Paramâtman is a universal soul from which, according to Vedantism, emanates this world of phenomena, and in a certain sense it may be said to correspond to the Tathâgata-garbha of Buddhism. Jîvâtman is the ego-soul as it is conceived by ignorant people as an independent entity directing all the mental activities. It is this latter âtman that was found to be void by Buddha when he arose from his long meditation, declaring: