Where it sits, and why it has this name
The discourse belongs to the Saṃyutta Nikāya of the Theravāda Pāli Canon: chapter 22, the Linked Discourses on the Aggregates, in the section «Involvement», number 22.59. The Pāli name Anattalakkhaṇa joins anatta (not-self) and lakkhaṇa (characteristic, mark), hence the usual Vietnamese name. In Ven. Thích Minh Châu's translation it is headed «Năm Vị (Vô ngã tưởng)», where «Năm Vị», «the five», refers to the group of five monks who heard it.
The setting is told in the first chapter of the Great Chapter (Mahāvagga) of the Vinaya. Venerable Koṇḍañña sees the Dhamma during the first discourse itself; then Vappa and Bhaddiya, and after them Mahānāma and Assaji, see it in turn, and all five ask to go forth. Only then does the Buddha give this teaching on not-self; the Great Chapter records that there were then six arahants in the world.
Structure: three ways of examining the aggregates
The translation's paragraphs are numbered up to 23. The first part takes each aggregate in turn: if form were self, it would not lead to affliction, and one could wish one's form to be thus and not otherwise; but because form is not-self, it leads to affliction and cannot be had as one wishes. The same reasoning is applied to feeling, perception, volitional formations and consciousness.
The second part is a dialogue. The Buddha asks whether form is permanent or impermanent – impermanent, the five answer; whether what is impermanent is suffering or happiness – suffering; whether what is impermanent, suffering and subject to change is fit to be regarded as mine, as what I am, as my self – no, venerable sir. The question is put again for each aggregate up to consciousness.
The third part widens the view to every case: any form at all – past, future or present, internal or external, gross or subtle, inferior or superior, far or near – is to be seen as it really is with right wisdom: this is not mine, this I am not, this is not my self. Seeing thus, the noble disciple grows disenchanted with the five aggregates; through disenchantment comes dispassion, through dispassion liberation, and he knows that birth is ended. The discourse closes as the five rejoice, and while it is being spoken their minds are freed from the taints, without clinging.
Meaning: seeing the aggregates as they are
The discourse gives no abstract definition of «self». It takes each part of body and mind that we usually take to be ourselves and asks: does it obey my wishes, does it last, is it worth holding on to as «me»? Two arguments go together: we cannot command it, and what is impermanent is suffering. Not-self here is not a claim that no one exists, but an invitation to look closely and stop identifying with what is always changing. The three characteristics – impermanence, suffering and not-self – appear together in the dialogue; many doctrinal teachings call them together the Three Marks.
Reading and chanting it
The page shows about 930 words, some 4 minutes of silent reading; you can read the Vietnamese, the English, or both side by side. The «…» marks stand for repeated sentences written in short, for example on perception; read them as said in full, as for form and feeling. Press «Chant» for the text to scroll and a wooden fish to keep the beat. Reading online is free; the library has no Pāli original, recording or download yet.
Parallels in the Chinese canon
Sūtra 34, «The Five Monks», in scroll 2 of the Saṃyukta Āgama has the same place, the same listeners and the same reasoning: form has no self, for if it had, sickness and suffering would not arise in form; then comes the dialogue on impermanence and suffering, and the contemplation of all form as neither self nor belonging to self. It ends with the monks rejoicing in the teaching and does not mention the five being liberated.
«Phật Thuyết Ngũ Uẩn Giai Không Kinh» – the name means «the five aggregates are all empty» – is also the Buddha's teaching to the five monks in the Deer Park; it adds a word on the three kinds of suffering (the suffering of pain, of change and of conditioned existence) and ends as the minds of the five are freed from the defilements. The library holds two Vietnamese translations of it: one glosses the Sanskrit terms within the sentences, the other reads more plainly and has notes at the end.
