Person
Siddhartha Gautama
the Buddha
Siddhartha Gautama lived in northern India around the fifth century BCE—exact dates are debated among historians—and became known as the Buddha, meaning “the awakened one.” His teaching began with a practical question: why do human beings suffer, and can that suffering end?
Rather than offering a metaphysical system first, he invited close inspection of experience. What we call “me” turns out, on examination, to be composed of changing processes—body, feeling, perception, mental formations, consciousness—none of which qualifies as a permanent, independent self. This analysis leads to the teaching of not-self, anatta, and to the central role of craving in how suffering renews itself.
Later Buddhist schools developed his teaching in diverse directions—monastic and lay, philosophical and devotional, across Asia and eventually worldwide. What they often share is a sustained interest in how the sense of self is built, defended, and possibly seen through.
A few words worth clarifying
- anatta
- A Buddhist teaching usually translated as “not-self.” It does not simply mean that you do not exist. It points to the difficulty of finding one permanent, independent “me” behind experience that is always changing.
Featured connections
Why are these connected?
parallel
The same question, different answers
Neither accepts the everyday “me” without looking more closely at what it rests on.
Both the Buddha and Ramana Maharshi take ordinary identity with unusual seriousness. Buddhism develops the teaching of not-self; Ramana’s Advaita-related work points toward a deeper Self. The contrast is real, even when English summaries sound alike.
Not-self and Advaita Self are not the same claim. One tradition denies a permanent independent self; the other speaks of Self as ultimate.
Related: Ramana Maharshi
Why are these connected?
shared concept
The Buddha and not-self
In Buddhist traditions, not-self—anatta—is one of the central ways the teaching describes what careful investigation of “me” discovers, and what it does not discover.
Related: Not-self
Why are these connected?
shared concept
When thinking feels like “me”
Both take inner mental life seriously, as something bound up with how identity feels.
Many people live as though their thoughts are the self. The Buddha’s teaching begins by asking what can actually be found when that sense of “me” is looked at closely—not assumed, but examined.
Everyday reflection on thought does not yet imply the Buddhist analysis of not-self. Early Buddhism develops that teaching as a careful doctrinal inquiry into what experience is and is not.
Related: Thought
Why are these connected?
parallel
Parallel challenges to clinging
Both offer an ethical and spiritual critique of grasping.
Both traditions contain teachings that question attachment to status, possession, and the ordinary self-centered life.
Buddhist teaching explicitly develops not-self. Jesus teaches within a Jewish theological framework and does not teach the Buddhist doctrine of anatta.
Related: Jesus of Nazareth
Related doors
- Enter the teaching of not-selfNot-self is the teaching most directly linked to the Buddha's investigation of what we call “me.”
- See craving as the hingeIn early Buddhist analysis, craving is closely linked to how suffering renews itself.
- Begin from sufferingEarly Buddhist teaching begins with the practical problem of suffering.
Sources
Buddha – Encyclopaedia Britannica
Encyclopaedia Britannica · reference entry (updated periodically)
Secondary historical orientation for life and dating debates.
Scholarly interpretation · secondary
https://www.britannica.com/biography/Buddha
Dhammapada
Early Buddhist tradition (attributed teachings of the Buddha) · compiled in Pali Canon; dating debated
Accessible early Buddhist teachings on mind and conduct.
Primary source · primary
Pali Canon, Khuddaka Nikāya; English translations commonly used for study include those based on the Pali Text Society editions.
Anattalakkhana Sutta (SN 22.59)
Early Buddhist tradition · Pali Canon
Primary early source for not-self analysis.
Primary source · primary
Saṃyutta Nikāya 22.59; often titled “The Discourse on the Not-Self Characteristic.”