"To say that the five skandhas are by nature empty and their combination an illusion is not enough for those who have not actually experienced this fact. They want to see the problem solved according to...logic....The teaching of anatman is the expression of an experience, and not at all a logical conclusion. However much they try to reach it by their logical subtleties they fail, or their reasoning lacks the force of a final conviction.
Since the Buddha, many are the masters of the Abhidharma who have exhausted their power of ratiocination to establish logically the theory of anatman, but how many Buddhists or outsiders are there who are really intellectually convinced of the theory? If they have a conviction about this teaching it comes from their experience and not from theorizing. With the Buddha, an actual personal conviction came first; then came a logical construction to back up the conviction. It did not matter very much indeed whether or not this construction was satisfactorily completed, for the conviction, that is the experience itself, was a fait accompli."
D. T. Suzuki
Zen Buddhism
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