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sakkāyasamudayo

sakkāyasamudaya

masc nom sg of sakkāyasamudaya (noun)

1. source of the sense of self; origin of individual identification; arising of the idea 'I am'

Built from

• sakkāya — stem · individual body; person
  From sakka 'own' + kāya 'body'. The Buddhist term for the psychophysical individual erroneously believed to be a permanent self (ātman).
• samudaya — stem · arising; origination
  From sam 'together' + ud 'up, out' + √ay 'go, come'. Denotes the origination or becoming-manifest of phenomena, especially ignorance and craving in the causal chain of suffering.

Analysis. sakkāya (individual body, person) + samudaya (arising, origin). The compound denotes the origination of the illusion of a permanent self—one of the twelve links of dependent origination (paṭiccasamuppāda). In the Abhidhamma, it marks the first moment of consciousness touching sense experience, generating the false notion of 'I am'.

Etymology. sakkāya: from sakka (one's own, belonging to oneself; Sanskrit sva-) + kāya (body, person; Sanskrit kāya, cognate with Greek κάϊα and Old Norse hús through Indo-European *keh₂-); literally 'one's own body', used in Pali to mean the psychophysical individual or personality. samudaya: from sam (together) + ud (up, out of) + √ay (to go, to come), 'arising', 'origination'. Together sakkāyasamudaya captures the arising of the illusion of a persisting self from the flux of body and mind.

Meanings from the Digital Pāḷi Dictionary; morphology and etymology by Claude.

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