When we take the betu aspect of the causal chain, we cannot
think of anything else but succession, but when we take the
paccaya aspect we can have a better vision into the nature of the
cause as ground. Thus when avijja is said to be the ground
of the sa@nkharas in the nine ways mentioned above, it seems
reasonable to think that the sa@nkharas were in some sense
regarded as special manifestations of avijja [Footnote ref 2]. But as this
point was not further developed in the early Buddhist texts it would
be unwise to proceed further with it.
The Khandhas.
The word khandha (Skr. skandha) means the trunk of a tree
and is generally used to mean group or aggregate [Footnote ref 3]. We
have seen that Buddha said that there was no atman (soul). He said
that when people held that they found the much spoken of soul,
they really only found the five khandhas together or any one of
them. The khandhas are aggregates of bodily and psychical
states which are immediate with us and are divided into five
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[Footnote 1: See _Pa@tisambhidamagga_, vol.
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