It is clear, however, that here we are only able to follow the Buddha further, if we have first convinced ourselves that the dissolution of personality into the five components just enumerated, as given by him, is really correct and exhaustive, that it is to say, if the essence of personality shall have become quite clear to us. Therefore we shall first have to deal with this question.

"P

PERSONALITY

ersonality, personality, is said, Venerable One; but what is personality, does the Blessed One say?" Thus the adherent Visakha asked the sage nun Dhammadinnā, his former wife. "The five groups of grasping are personality: that is the Grasping-group of the corporeal form, the Grasping-group of sensation, the Grasping-group of perception, the Graspinggroup of the activities of the mind, the Grasping-group of consciousness. These five groups of grasping, friend Visakha, constitute the personality, so the Blessed One has said." 44 After this, according to the Buddha, personality consists of five groups: the body, the sensations, the perceptions, the activities of the mind, and the consciousness. But these groups are not simply groups, but more closely defined as groups of grasping. Therefore to understand the definition given by the Buddha, insight must be gained into two things. First, that personality is really exhausted by these five groups, that it is summed up in them; secondly, why the Buddha calls them just groups of grasping.

The answer to this last question is the fundamental antecedent condition for understanding the essence of personality. Therefore it properly ought to be given first. For in order to comprehend something as the sum of a number of definite groups, before all, the general character

of these groups itself must be known, consisting in our case precisely in this, that it is groups of grasping which constitute the personality. But as far as we have got at present, a thorough treatment of this question is for systematical reasons not yet possible. Therefore we cannot do otherwise than anticipate the result of our later expositions and assume it until then as established. This result is, briefly, as follows. According to the Buddha, our essence is not exhausted by our personality; we only grasp it, we only cling to it, though so tightly that we imagine ourselves to consist in it, "as if a man with hands besmeared with resin caught hold of a twig."45 Therefore it is nothing but an expression of this fact, when the Buddha calls the five groups forming our personality, groups of grasping, Upādānakkhandhā.*

We must always bear in mind this character of the five groups, when under the guidance of the Buddha we now try to comprehend them as the sole and complete components of our personality, and this in accordance with the principle of the Buddha intuitively, in such a manner that we look through their machinery in form of the personality precisely as through the composition and the working together of the parts of an ingeniously constructed machine we have fully understood.

The basis of the personality is formed by the material body. It originates in the moment of generation by father and mother from the several chemical materials the Buddha

*) The word we translate here by personality is Sakkāya. It is composed from sat-kāya: kāya meaning, as the definition given at the beginning of this chapter indicates, the summary of the five groups: corporeal form, sensation, perception, mentations, consciousness; sat meaning "being". By Sakkaya therefore the summary of the five groups is defined as the real being-that is, of ourselves,-expressing thus that we entirely consist in these five groups.

Just this same content our conception of personality possesses. For it is thought of as a being existing for itself, that exhausts itself in the marks—just these five groups wherein it appears. Sakkaya and personality are thus indeed equivalent terms.

sums up under the four chief-elements, the earthy, watery, fiery and airy one. These materials constitute the female egg as well as the male spermatic cell, and, further, they furnish the matter for building up the body, which is drawn from the blood of the mother, and worked up into the form of the new body. This upbuilding being finished, the body is born and further sustained in similar fashion, in that, by taking nonrishment to replace the particles incessantly streaming away, new substitutes are brought in from the four chief-elements: "This my formed body is composed of the four elements, generated by father and mother, built up from rice, porridge and sour gruel."

This body, constituted thus, shows itself endowed with organs of sense equally consisting of the four chief-elements. By this, that is, by the "body endowed with the six organs of sense," we have what is generally, and also by the Buddha himself, designated as the body or, more exactly, as the corporeal form, rūpa: "Just as the enclosed space which we call a house comes to be through the conjunction of timbers and bindweed and grass and mud, in the selfsame way, through the conjunction of bone and sinew and flesh and skin, there comes to be this enclosed space which we call a body."47

The corporeal form thus consists exclusively of the four chief-elements. The materials from which it is built up, are throughout identical with the inorganic substances of the external world, they are directly taken from it, and afterwards they return to union with it. Only when incorporated into the body they are brought into the form peculiar to this, just as the materials from which a house is built up have also be worked into a form belonging to this kind of struc

ture.

Evident as this fact is, and unconditioned as it is generally conceded to be from the purely rational point of

view*, nevertheless it is known with perfectly clear consciousness only by very few; which is a clear proof, how very shallow the "normal" perception is. But this fact must be penetrated by longer reflection in its full significance, if we wish fully to understand the essence of personality! The basis of this personality, the body together with the organs of sense, is nothing but a mere collection and transformation of dead matter from external nature; nay, in the main, it consists simply of worked-up dung.

One would imagine that, with this state of things really penetrated, even now it ought to a matter for some astonishment that men should cling to a structure with such a basis, namely, to this same personality, as to the highest they know. But just from this it will probably also become clear why the Buddha lays such stress upon the penetration of this basis of our personality as of a mere conjunction of the substances comprised in the four chief-elements:

"What now, brethren, is the earthy element? The earthy element may be either internal or external; whereof the internal division is as follows. Whatsoever is found in the subject proper to the person, of a hard or solid nature, such as the hair of the head or of the body, nails, teeth, skin, flesh, sinews, bones, marrow, kidneys, heart, liver, pleura, spleen, lungs, intestines, mesentery, stomach, excrement and whatever else of hard or solid nature exists in the subject proper to the person, this is called the internal earthy eleWhatsoever exists of the earthy element, whether belonging to the subject or foreign to the subject, all is designated as the earthy element. And what is the watery element? The watery element may be either internal or external; whereof the internal division is as follows. Whatsoever is found in the subject proper to the person,

ment.

of a

"Think, o Man, that you are dust and shall return to dust," the Catholic church also calls to her adherents before every corpse.

fluid or watery nature, such as bile, phlegm, pus, blood, perspiration, fat, tears, sperm, spittle, nasal mucus, oil of the joints, urine and whatever else of a fluid or watery nature exists in the subject proper to the person-this is called the internal watery element. Whatsoever exists of the watery element, whether belonging to the subject or foreign to the subject, all is designated as the watery element. And what is the fiery element? The fiery element may be either internal or external; whereof the internal division is as follows: Whatsoever is found in the subject proper to the person, of the nature of heat or fire, such as that wherethrough warmth is present, whereby digestion takes place, whereby the physical frame becomes heated, whereby what is eaten and drunken, tasted and swallowed undergoes complete transformation, and whatever else of a hot or fiery nature exists in the subject proper to the person-this is called the internal fiery element. Whatsoever exists of the fiery element, whether belonging to the subject or foreign to the subject-all is designated as the fiery element. And what is the airy element? The airy element may be either internal or external; whereof the internal division is as follows. Whatsoever is found in the subject proper to the person, of the nature of air or wind, such as the up-coming airs and the down-going airs, the wind seated in stomach and intestines, the airs that traverse the limbs, the incoming and outgoing breaths-this and whatever else of an airy or windy nature exists in the subject proper to the person is called the internal airy element. Whatsoever exists of the airy element, whether belonging to the subject or foreign to the subject-all is designated as the fiery element."48 Thus the Buddha entirely equilibrates the materials building up our body with those of the external world; he even identifies them with the latter.

But the body composed thus, together with the organs of sense, is, as said above, nothing but the basis of the per