[Buddha-l] FW: Three year Research Associate, UK, Indian & Buddhist theories of self

[curt]

I think it is worth emphasizing that in addition to modern 
"psychological" theories, there is a much older, more deeply embedded 
conception of self in the western psyche. It is the "self" of the 
Delphic maxim "gnothi seauton", which was adopted by Socrates and became 
central to all of Greek philosophy as we know it. This self has several 
important characteristics:

(1) First and foremost it is uniquely capable of self-awareness. Other 
mental faculties/activities are not.
(2) It is the agent of both reason and volition (which seems odd to me, 
because in my experience the two almost never go together!)
(3) It is the essence of who we are.
(3a) As a corrolary to the above "what we are" (our essence) is NOT 
anything else - such as the physical body.
(4) It is Divine in it's origin - and it is the link between humans and 
the Divine.
(5) For Platonists, the self is non-corporeal and capable of DIRECT self 
awareness, whereas for Stoics and Epicureans the self is material and 
probably not truly capable of absolutely direct self-awareness. This 
seems to parallel a similar disagreement with Tsongkhapa and Mipham.

All of these characteristics (except for the last) are spelled out by 
Epictetus in the opening paragraphs of his Discourses. They are also 
central to Socrates' famous conversation with Alcibiades in the dialog 
of that name.

Often it is the ideas that we don't know about rattling around in our 
heads that have the biggest and most pervasive influences - precisely 
because we are unaware of those influences. Which, of course, is the 
entire freaking point of "gnothi seauton"!

- Curt