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This idea ends up sounding like, “You do reincarnate, but you just don’t have a soul.” For years and years that’s exactly how I took it. After reading Philip Kapleau’s The Zen of Living and Dying in which he gives a very thorough and detailed explanation of why the Buddhist idea of rebirth is different from the usual idea of reincarnation I figured I had the whole thing down pat. Though Kapleau’s ideas are well presented and logical, I think the best answer to the question of what Zen people think about reincarnation goes like this:

A guy walks up to a Zen master and asks, “Is there life after death? The Zen Master says, “How should I know?” The guys replies indignantly, “Because you’re a Zen master!” “Yes,” says the Zen master, “but not a dead one.”

When people ask about life after death they’re assuming they accurately understand life during life. But do they? Do you?

This the one of the most important questions any of us can ask ourselves.

When Gautama Buddha was asked about life after death, eternal existence, the origin of the universe, whether space is finite or infinite, and other such imponderables, he said, “The question does not fit the case.” Being less formal, I might phrase the same thing this way: “That’s the wrong question, doofus!”

There’s plenty of discussion on both sides about the matter of rebirth and reincarnation, but quoting quotes from books, even good ones, will never solve any problem—even the philosophical ones. If I just quoted Buddha and Dogen and left it at that I’d be like one of those guys with the bumper stickers that say, “THE BIBLE SAID IT, I BELIEVE IT, AND THAT SETTLES IT.” I hate that kind of thing and I’ll bet those bumper stickers don’t do much for you either.

Nonetheless, I’m gonna give you my take on the whole reincarnation thing. But it’s what you see for yourself—what you realize for yourself—that really counts. What I say here is just another thing written in another book.

But here it is:

Our brain likes to label things. That’s its job. In our minds—and for the moment I’m using the words “mind” and “brain” to refer to the same thing—there is something we call “me.” Our “me” consists of all of our memories, dreams for the future, likes and dislikes, ideas and opinions, thoughts and perceptions, and so on. We have a whole catalogue of “me” stuff like this. But “me” is also our label for something ineffable, something we cannot put into words. It’s a name we have for something we really don’t understand but assume is there. Fundamentally we don’t understand any of the things we give names to. I might call you “Buttnugget” but Buttnugget is just a name I have for an image in my brain that I associate with you. It doesn’t mean I have any idea what the world looks like through your eyes.

In moments of balance and clarity, we can see that what we call “me” does not belong to us at all. It is the possession of the universe. It is the universe. Subject and object are the same. Nishijima says, “My personality extends throughout the universe.” This something, this thing we sometimes call “me” and we sometimes call “everyone and everything else,” is the same as the present moment. We think we have a mind of our own. We don’t. We partake in a mind that includes all of creation. The present moment is eternal. It’s always there. It is unborn and it cannot die. And it does not reincarnate.

Nor does it hold any beliefs or opinions, for or against anything at all.

You prefer The Pogues to The Backstreet Boys, but the universe does not. It should, of course, but it includes and embraces both of them equally. Yet you and the universe are one and the same.

If we sit behind the old railway station in Kent, Ohio, and watch the Cuyahoga River flow, ignoring the noise from the frat boys harassing the art students on Water Street, we’ll see lots of bubbles on the river’s surface. They float along on the river for a while then burst. The bubbles are just air and water. The water returns to the river.