It’s the same with this body which we call ‘saṅkhāra’. Although the Buddha has already explained that the body is not substantial or a real being as such, we still don’t agree, we stubbornly cling to it. If the body could talk, it would be telling us all day long, ‘You’re not my owner, you know.’ Actually it’s telling us all the time, but it’s Dhamma language, so we’re unable to understand it.

For instance, the sense organs of [the] eye, ear, nose, tongue and body are continually changing, but I’ve never seen them ask permission from us even once! Like when we have a headache or a stomach ache the body never asks permission first, it just goes right ahead, following its natural course. This shows that the body doesn’t allow anyone to be its owner, it doesn’t have an owner. The Buddha described it as an object void of substance.

We don’t understand the Dhamma and so we don’t understand these saṅkhāra; we take them to be ourselves, as belonging to us or belonging to others. This gives rise to clinging. When clinging arises, ‘becoming’ follows. Once becoming arises, then there is birth. Once there is birth, then old age, sickness, death … the whole mass of suffering arises.

The Collected Teachings of Ajahn Chah: The Middle Way Within, pages 5

Source: Dhammacetiya

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