THE UNIVERSE AND MAN THEREIN

Life in the world, according to Buddhism, is not the product of a willed process of creation. The genesis of the universe is one thing, and the genesis of life therein is yet another. Life of man is held in Buddhism to be a bit more than mere externally animated matter. Life was not blown into man as into a clay image at any stage by any creator. Life of man has its own psychic content. This, which is referred to as viññâna, is personally different in each individual in terms of its own construction.

This life-continuum-consciousness or samvattanika-viññâna [M.N.II.262] extends forward through time and space and is also traceable backward by means of specially developed human faculties like wisdom of scanning former births or pubbe nivâsânussati ñâna [See also D.N.III.105 where it is referred to as viññâna-sota or stream of consciousness]. According to early Buddhist teachings of the Pali Canon, this is by no means a disembodied soul or a posthumous existence of the human in an astral form, floating about or roaming around in search of a human [or as claimed by some even an animal] womb.

The grossness or fineness of the psyche, quality wise, as a life determinant of the human, bestowing happiness [sukham] or unhappiness [dukkham] on him [See Dhammapada vv.1 & 2], depends on the life style adopted by a being during his entire samsâric sojourning [ i.e.of the process of continuous births and deaths]. Thus while the world or the universe in which one finds oneself continues to grow or extend through time and space, any being who dwells therein could, by his own endeavour, so well perfect his or her life process, thereby bringing about the termination of this very phenomenon of mundane existence  [bhava-nirodhâ jâti-nirodho]. This brings unhappiness of life or the living process to its total end.
 

004. He who dwells, viewing the world as a source of constant happiness, and lacking in restraint of one's senses in responding to it, not knowing the limits of eating, and also lazy and lacking in initiative, such a person tends to perish as easily as a weak tree in the face of a strong wind. Whosoever stands up to the opposites of these, he stays firm and steady like a rocky mountain. [ Dhammapada vv. 7 & 8 ].