Samsara: Encyclopedia II - Samsara - Saṃsāra in Buddhism

Samsara - Saṃsāra in Buddhism

Samsara - Saṃsāra in Nikaya Buddhism

Whereas in Hinduism some being (ātman, jiva, etc.) is regarded as being subject to Saṃsāra, Buddhism was founded on a rejection of such metaphysical substances, and originally accounts for the process of rebirth/reincarnation by appeal to phenomenological or psychological constituents. Later schools of Buddhism such as the Pudgalavada, however, re-introduce the concept of a "person" which transmigrates. The basic idea that there is a cycle of birth and rebirth is, however, not questioned in early Buddhism and its successors, and neither is, generally, the concept that saṃsāra is a negative condition to be abated through religious practice concluding in the achievement of final nirvāṇa.

Samsara - Saṃsāra in Mahayana Buddhism

According to several strands of the Mahayana Buddhist tradition, the division of saṃsāra and nirvāṇa is attacked using an argument that extends some of the basic premises of anatta and of Buddha's attack on orthodox accounts of existence. This is found poetically in the "Perfection of Wisdom" literature and more analytically in the philosophy of Nāgārjuna and later writers. It is not entirely clear which aspects of this theoretical move were developed first in the sutras and which in the philosophical tradition.

Samsara - Saṃsāra in Tibetan Buddhism

Samsara is uncontrollably recurring rebirth, filled with suffering and problems (according to Kalachakra tantra as explained by Dr. A. Berzin).

Adapted from the Wikipedia article "Saṃsāra in Buddhism", under the G.N U Free Docmentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki