Gier, Nicholas and Petta, Johnson. “Hebrew and Buddhist Selves: A Constructive Postmodern Study.” Asian Philosophy 17, no. 1 (March 2007): 47-64.

Abstract

Our task will be to demonstrate that there are instructive parallels between Hebrew and Buddhist concepts of self. There are at least five main constituents (skandhas in Sanskrit) of Hebrew self: (1) nepes as living being; (2) ruah as indwelling spirit; (3) leb as heart-mind; (4) basar as flesh; and (5) dam as blood. We will compare these with the five Buddhist skandahs: disposition (samskara), consciousness (vijnana), feeling (bedana), perception (Samjna), and body (rupa). Generally, what we will discover is that both Buddhists and Hebrews have a 'bundle' theory of the self: both see the body as an essential part of personal identity; both overcome that modernist distinction of the inner and the outer; and both avoid language about the will as a distinct faculty. In sum, both present us with a fully somatic and nondualistic view of being human.