William asked:

Are there any Buddhists who do not believe in reincarnation. I have previously been told that 'no, it
would be like a christian not believing in an afterlife'. This answer has nagged at me ever since - it
seems hard to believe that it is intuitively correct, even though I know intuition is often false.

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The interesting question here is what would be the philosophical implications ofa person's sincerely
combining the characteristic beliefs of Buddhism with disbelief in reincarnation. Whether or not there
are in fact any such persons is an empirical matter. The fact that a view is absurd or illogical does not
necessarily prevent people from believing it.

The concern of Christians (and Moslems and Jews) in the existence of an afterlife has a superficially
similar motivation to the concern of the Buddhist. The problem is reconciling the injustices of the
world with the belief that the universe as a whole is, ultimately, just rather than unjust. If the universe
is ultimately unjust, than it becomes much harder to believe in the existence of objective moral laws.

However, the remark 'it would be like a Christian not believing in an afterlife' masks two very
significant differences between Buddhism and the Judeo-Christian religions. As a Jew, I have a
personal interest in my survival after my material body has ceased to be. In Buddhism, by contrast,
this 'personal interest' is regarded as the product of a metaphysical illusion concerning the
substantiality of the self. The goal is to be permanently freed from this illusion. Only then will
'suffering' truly cease.

A further, very important difference is that it would seem to be extremely difficult for a Christian,
Moslem or Jew to cast doubt on the existence of an afterlife without thereby putting into question the
central belief in a transcendent Deity. There are, however, those who are prepared to take the radical
option (like the 'God is dead' Protestant theology that arose in the 60's) to give up the literal belief in a
Deity. By contrast, the core of Buddhist teaching is a negative, rather than a positive doctrine
concerning the illusoriness of the self. It is consequently easier to see how such a negative,
philosophically motivated view could survive the sceptical rejection of belief in reincarnation.

Geoffrey Klempner