_How many Skandhas are there?_

A. Five.

235. Q. _Name the five Skandhas?_

A. Rupa, Vedana, Sanna, Samkhara,_ and _Vinnana_.

236. Q. _Briefly explain what they are?_

A. __Rupa_, material qualities; _Vedana_, sensation; _Sanna_,
abstract ideas; _Samkhara_, tendencies of mind; _Vinnana_,
mental powers, or consciousness. Of these we are formed; by them we
are conscious of existence; and through them communicate with the world
about us.

237. Q. _To what cause must we attribute the differences in the
combination of the five Skandhas which make every individual differ
from every other individual?_

A. To the ripened Karma of the individual in his preceding births.

238. Q. _What is the force of energy that is at work, under the
guidance of Karma, to produce the new being?_

A. Tanha--the will to _live_.[12]

239. Q. _Upon what is the doctrine of rebirths founded?_

A. Upon the perception that perfect justice, equilibrium and
adjustment are inherent in the universal system of Nature. Buddhists
do not believe that one life--even though it were extended to one
hundred or five hundred years--is long enough for the reward or
punishment of a man's deeds. The great circle of rebirths will be more
or less quickly run through according to the preponderating purity or
impurity of the several lives of the individual.

240. Q. _Is this new aggregation of Skandhas--this new
personality--the same being as that in the previous birth, whose
Tanha has brought it into existence?_

A. In one sense it is a new being; in another it is not. In
Pali it is--"_nacha so nacha anno_" which means not the same nor
yet another. During this life the _Skandhas_ are constantly
changing;[13] and while the man A. B., of forty, is identical, as
regards personality, with the youth A. B., of eighteen, yet, by the
continual waste and reparation of his body, and change of mind and
character, he is a different being. Nevertheless, the man in his old
age justly reaps the reward of suffering consequent upon his thoughts
and actions at every previous stage of his life. So the new being of a
rebirth, being the same individuality as before, but with a changed
form, or new aggregation of _Skandhas_, justly reaps the consequences
of his actions and thoughts in the previous existence.

241. Q. _But the aged man remembers the incidents of his youth,
despite his being physically and mentally changed. Why, then, is not
the r