[Kausilwf]

This essay REBIRTH AND THE IN-BETWEEN STATE IN EARLY BUDDHISM is an interesting example. Extreme intellectualism but definitely a contraversial interpretation of the Four Noble Truths and other suttas.

Personally, I would disagree with the interpretation of the suttas below, which are definitely not in accord with the meditative Forest Tradition.

In his first sermon, which is represented by at least 17 versions in all Buddhist languages, the Buddha presented the Four Noble Truths: suffering, its origin, cessation, and the path. The first term in the definition of suffering is jāti, which we translate as 'birth', although 'conception' might be more accurate. Note that birth is an existential problem, to be overcome, and hence cannot merely refer to one's birth in this life. It must refer, as the universal testimony of the Buddhist traditions affirm, to rebirth in saṁsāra, as part of an endless stream of lives.

However, it would be incorrect to claim that the Buddha simply absorbed the universal Indian belief in rebirth. In fact, the ancient Vedas speak little of rebirth, and it only slowly appears in the post-Vedic literature. Historically, the Āgama Suttas are the oldest texts that place this rebirth complex in a central position, and we could well argue that the Hindu belief in rebirth was conditioned by the Buddhist belief rather than the other way around. But the Saṁyutta tells us: 'Whatever ascetics or priests there are that recollect their manifold past lives, all of them recollect the five graspingaggregates or one of them'. This suggests that the aggregates are empirical realities that characterize not just this life, but past lives as well. Thus the Saṁyutta tells us that the unawakened individual runs and circles around these five aggregates from one life to the next. The two Samyuttas, namely, the Khajjaniya Sutta and Gaddula Sutta, are about clinging to the five aggregates as "I" and "mine".

In fact, the term "past lives" is literally "previous abodes, dwellings or homes". Further, the term "samsara" does not mean "transmigration" but "to cycle" or "spin". Further, the five aggregates do not cling. They are not the "five clinging aggregates" but the five aggregates that are the subjects of clinging.

Extreme intellectualism but replete with inaccuracies and not in conformity with the intention of those particular suttas.

Each of those suttas was spoken to diminish the "I" and "mine" rather than build it up.

The Buddha certainly taught rebirth but not in the three suttas above.