user17628: As I delve into the Buddhist literature deeper and deeper, particularly the Theravāda sutta literature, I am getting convinced more and more that when we use the term ‘rebirth’, and more so, the grosser English equivalents like ‘metempsychosis’ and ‘re-incarnation’, to signify what the Buddha talked about when he referred to the apparent continuity of the ‘life process’ after death, we are getting it all wrong. I have till now also been unable to find the equivalent of the Vedic term ‘Punarjanma’, which is used so very profusely in the Brāhmanic literature like the Upaniṣads and the Purāṇas. The Sanskrit/Pāli word that comes up again and again in the Buddhist context is ‘bhava’ which has been translated as ‘becoming’, perhaps rightly so. But, would it be right to translate this very word also as rebirth, re-incarnation, punarjanma, and the like, when it seems so very clear that bhava does not stand at all for any of these, because the very notion of rebirth/re-incarnation/punarjanma carries within it the concept of a permanent entity moving from birth to birth?
I remember a beautiful metaphor from somewhere that compares the notion of this recurrence of saṁsāra in Hinduism with that in Buddhism. If this recurrence is like a necklace of pearls in Hinduism where the pearls stand for various janmas and the string for the eternal ātman, in Buddhism it is like a pile of coins where each coin, each birth, thought dependent for its support on the coin below, on the birth that came before, does not have any eternal binding entity holding them together, only the unseen ‘gravity’ of karma. Isn’t it right, therefore, that the actual term in the Buddhist sense, used for this recurrence of lives, ought to be bhava, or, to be technically more exact, punarbhava/punabbhava/’re-becoming’/recurrent becoming, rather that punarjanma/rebirth/re-incarnation/metempsychosis?

user13375: It is very clear that the english word 'rebirth' in Buddhist writing and practice causes a whole host of confusions and misunderstandings. This is evident in this forum with the myriad questions and debates that have erupted as a consequence. As an added complexity, not all of the confusions and misunderstandings are related or easily dispelled in the same way.
Now, with that said I don't quite know how to answer the question, "Is it right to use the term rebirth in the Buddhist context?"
Let's grant the supposition that the answer is yes and see what the consequences are:

The word 'rebirth' could be replaced with another english word or words
The word could be omitted entirely with a blank in its place

The problem with #1 is that this has already been tried. In fact, numerous other words have been suggested instead. You've mentioned two - metempsychosis and re-incarnation - but many more have been used in the past with transmigration being another heavily used synonym.
Some on this forum are heavily biased against the word 'rebirth' thinking it causes more confusion than not and have insisted that 'rebirth' was never uttered by the Buddha. Which is true insofar as the Buddha did not speak english.
For me, I see all of this arguing over the 'right' word to use as rather beside the point. I don't think it is true that there exists one or more 'right' words that would magically dispel all the confusion and misunderstanding that come along with the word 'rebirth' or the ideas that the word is used to convey.
My go to strategy to try and dispel the confusions and misunderstandings that the word 'rebirth' and the ideas behind it often inspire is to focus not on 'rebirth' from life-to-life, but rather 'rebirth' from moment-to-moment. Why? Because I've found that most Buddhists or people learning about Buddhism have an easier time thinking about and granting that 'rebirth' from moment-to-moment happens and can relate it back to their own daily moment-to-moment lives in an experiential way. And a lot of the same questions that pop-up in 'rebirth' from life-to-life also pop-up in a natural way in 'rebirth' from moment-to-moment.
Let's take your contention that, "the very notion of rebirth/re-incarnation/punarjanma carries within it the concept of a permanent entity moving from birth to birth?"... that is true of 'rebirth' from moment-to-moment as well isn't it? Don't we all have the sense and experience that there is some permanent entity moving from moment-to-moment? So if we can resolve how it can be that 'rebirth' from moment-to-moment happens all the while not having some permanent entity moving from moment-to-moment, - and it most undoubtedly does happen as we can all attest experientially, right? - then perhaps we can take that and extrapolate what it means for 'rebirth' to happen from life-to-life.

user8157: I will comment more later and provide sutta quotes. Initial points:

As said in the question, there appears no commonly used equivalent to punarjanma (puna-jati) in the Pali, apart from "dukkhā jāti punappunaṃ" found in Dhammapada 153. However, the meaning of "dukkhā jāti punappunaṃ" depends on the meaning of the word "jati". It is very clear by the Pali suttas as well as commentary such as the Visuddhimagga the word "jati" has numerous different contextual meanings and ultimately does not have the core meaning of "reincarnation", let alone "physical birth". The simplest example is the use of the word "jātiyā" in MN 86; kiṃjātiko found in many suttas; or the common use of the verb "jāyati" to refer to coming to be of mental phenomena, such as love, sorrow, rapture, etc.

In the words commonly translations of "rebirth", the words "jati", "janati" or "jayati", which have the root "jan", are generally not found. Instead, the words commonly translated as "rebirth" are based in the root "pad" rather than "jan".

However, there is the word "paccājāyati" (which does not include "puna") however this is rarely used and an investigation of it may find it does not mean "reincarnation" but, instead, "reclassification". "Paccājāyati" appears to be found in the context about the status of a "jati", such as "human", "god", "ghost", "animal", etc, rather than is used to describe the destinations or results of kamma, the later being by far the most common context where the translation "rebirth" is used. Here, in respect to kammic inheritance, words rooted in "pad" (such as "upapajjati", "upapanna", etc) are most commonly found. Note: MN 148 clearly shows the word "upapajjati" does not literally have any connection to "reincarnation" but merely means "to follow from the former".

As for the word "bhava", this is one of the three "asava" ("mental outflows"; together with sensuality and ignorance). It is obviously very wrong to say "bhava" means "reincarnation" because "bhava" is simply and literally a state of mind. For example, MN 44 says "bhava" is a cause of "identity". MN 121 says "bhava" is a "perception".



user16297: Good question, well thought out and described in detail. Your proposal 're-becoming' may be better than the other words, at not implying an immutable soul underlying, compared to 're-birth' and 're-incarnation', 'transmigration', etc.
But it has its problems as well. The biggest one being that it doesn't easily convey you're talking about rebecoming after a physical death.
In the end, it comes down to what people agree on for a convention, or official dictionary definition. Theravadans usually prefer 'rebirth' over 'reincarnation' and the other words. Originally in the dictionary, 'rebirth' didn't even have to do with physical death and what happens after. That's probably why Theravadins chose 'rebirth' over the more widely used 'reincarnation', and other words.
Now that the Buddhist idea of 'rebirth' is in some dictionaries, it seems to be more commonly understood in Theravadin Buddhist context does not entail a permanent soul underlying. Other religions though, like Hinduism, use 'rebirth', 'reincarnation', with a soul/atta.
As long as the convention ('rebirth' in this case) is basically well understood, it's best to stick with it, otherwise you'll waste a lot of time having to explain to people what your new word means exactly.
The time to abandon words, is when it suddenly achieves wide adoption with a completely different and wrong meaning (compared to the original). For example, 'gay' used to mean 'happy and joyful', but once the common definition became 'homosexual', then you have to respect convention and change to a different word or risk being misunderstood.

user471: Dhammapada 153 - 154 in Pali:

Anekajātisaṃsāraṃ,
sandhāvissaṃ anibbisaṃ;
Gahakāraṃ gavesanto,
dukkhā jāti punappunaṃ.
Gahakāraka diṭṭhosi,
puna gehaṃ na kāhasi;
Sabbā te phāsukā bhaggā,
gahakūṭaṃ visaṅkhataṃ;
Visaṅkhāragataṃ cittaṃ,
taṇhānaṃ khayamajjhagā.

Translation of Dhammapada 153 - 154 by Ven. Buddharakkhita:


Through many a birth in samsara have I wandered in vain,
seeking the builder of this house (of life). Repeated birth is indeed
suffering!

O house-builder, you are seen! You will not build this house again.
For your rafters are broken and your ridgepole shattered. My
mind has reached the Unconditioned; I have attained the destruction of
craving.



Repeated birth here is "jāti punappunaṃ".
From Ven. Nyanatiloka's Pali dictionary entry on "jāti":

jāti：'birth'，comprises the entire embryonic process beginning with conception and ending with parturition．
＂The birth of beings belonging to this or that order of beings，their
being born，their conception （okkanti） and springing into
existence，the manifestation of the groups
（corporeality，feeling，perception，mental formations，consciousness；
s．khandha），the acquiring of their sensitive organs：this is called
birth＂ （D．22）．For its conditioning by the prenatal kamma-process
（kamma-bhava； s．bhava），s．paṭiccasamuppāda （9，10），paṭisandhi．

One of Wisdomlib's entries on jāti states:

Jati or jata means arising or coming up.

The Dhp 154 commentary by Ven. Buddharakkhita states:

According to the (traditional) commentary, these verses are the
Buddha's "Song of Victory," his first utterance after his
Enlightenment. The house is individualized existence in samsara,
the house-builder craving, the
rafters the passions and the ridge-pole ignorance.

From these, and from other references on clinging aggregates (SN 22.48) and Nibbana-element with residue remaining (Iti 44), my take on this is that "birth" simply means the arising of one's individuality (the self, the music of the Vina Sutta), based on the operation of the five clinging aggregates (the lute) working together in the way described by dependent origination.
And repeated birth refers to repeated occurrences of this, sustained by craving as described in SN 44.9.
Ven. Buddharakkhita's commentary above supports this.

Another interesting fact is that in some suttas like AN 5.28, "past lives" is the usual translation for "pubbenivāsaṃ", which literally means "previous homes". "Homes" and "houses"  (from Dhp 154) sound similar, don't you think?

user43: In suttas Buddha uses two kinds of language. One language employs worldly concepts such as rebirth. Another language introduces technical concepts such as Dependent Origination.
The first type of language is very simplistic and is meant for beginners, the technical language is much more precise and is meant for advanced students.

17628: <p>As I delve into the Buddhist literature deeper and deeper, particularly the Theravāda sutta literature, I am getting convinced more and more that when we use the term ‘rebirth’, and more so, the grosser English equivalents like ‘metempsychosis’ and ‘re-incarnation’, to signify what the Buddha talked about when he referred to the apparent continuity of the ‘life process’ after death, we are getting it all wrong. I have till now also been unable to find the equivalent of the Vedic term ‘Punarjanma’, which is used so very profusely in the Brāhmanic literature like the Upaniṣads and the Purāṇas. The Sanskrit/Pāli word that comes up again and again in the Buddhist context is ‘bhava’ which has been translated as ‘becoming’, perhaps rightly so. But, would it be right to translate this very word also as rebirth, re-incarnation, punarjanma, and the like, when it seems so very clear that bhava does not stand at all for any of these, because the very notion of rebirth/re-incarnation/punarjanma carries within it the concept of a permanent entity moving from birth to birth?</p>
<p>I remember a beautiful metaphor from somewhere that compares the notion of this recurrence of saṁsāra in Hinduism with that in Buddhism. If this recurrence is like a necklace of pearls in Hinduism where the pearls stand for various janmas and the string for the eternal ātman, in Buddhism it is like a pile of coins where each coin, each birth, thought dependent for its support on the coin below, on the birth that came before, does not have any eternal binding entity holding them together, only the unseen ‘gravity’ of karma. Isn’t it right, therefore, that the actual term in the Buddhist sense, used for this recurrence of lives, ought to be bhava, or, to be technically more exact, punarbhava/punabbhava/’re-becoming’/recurrent becoming, rather that punarjanma/rebirth/re-incarnation/metempsychosis?</p>
 13375: <p>It is very clear that the english word 'rebirth' in Buddhist writing and practice causes a whole host of confusions and misunderstandings. This is evident in this forum with the myriad questions and debates that have erupted as a consequence. As an added complexity, not all of the confusions and misunderstandings are related or easily dispelled in the same way.</p>
<p>Now, with that said I don't quite know how to answer the question, &quot;Is it right to use the term rebirth in the Buddhist context?&quot;</p>
<p>Let's grant the supposition that the answer is yes and see what the consequences are:</p>
<ol>
<li>The word 'rebirth' could be replaced with another english word or words</li>
<li>The word could be omitted entirely with a blank in its place</li>
</ol>
<p>The problem with #1 is that this has already been tried. In fact, numerous other words have been suggested instead. You've mentioned two - metempsychosis and re-incarnation - but many more have been used in the past with transmigration being another heavily used synonym.</p>
<p>Some on this forum are heavily biased against the word 'rebirth' thinking it causes more confusion than not and have insisted that 'rebirth' was never uttered by the Buddha. Which is true insofar as the Buddha did not speak english.</p>
<p>For me, I see all of this arguing over the 'right' word to use as rather beside the point. I don't think it is true that there exists one or more 'right' words that would magically dispel all the confusion and misunderstanding that come along with the word 'rebirth' or the ideas that the word is used to convey.</p>
<p>My go to strategy to try and dispel the confusions and misunderstandings that the word 'rebirth' and the ideas behind it often inspire is to focus not on 'rebirth' from life-to-life, but rather 'rebirth' from moment-to-moment. Why? Because I've found that most Buddhists or people learning about Buddhism have an easier time thinking about and granting that 'rebirth' from moment-to-moment happens and can relate it back to their own daily moment-to-moment lives in an experiential way. And a lot of the same questions that pop-up in 'rebirth' from life-to-life also pop-up in a natural way in 'rebirth' from moment-to-moment.</p>
<p>Let's take your contention that, &quot;the very notion of rebirth/re-incarnation/punarjanma carries within it the concept of a permanent entity moving from birth to birth?&quot;... that is true of 'rebirth' from moment-to-moment as well isn't it? Don't we all have the sense and experience that there is some permanent entity moving from moment-to-moment? So if we can resolve how it can be that 'rebirth' from moment-to-moment happens all the while not having some permanent entity moving from moment-to-moment, - and it most undoubtedly <em>does</em> happen as we can all attest experientially, right? - then perhaps we can take that and extrapolate what it <em>means</em> for 'rebirth' to happen from life-to-life.</p>
 8157: <p>I will comment more later and provide sutta quotes. Initial points:</p>
<ol>
<li><p>As said in the question, there appears no commonly used equivalent to punarjanma (puna-jati) in the Pali, apart from &quot;dukkhā jāti punappunaṃ&quot; found in Dhammapada 153. However, the meaning of &quot;dukkhā jāti punappunaṃ&quot; depends on the meaning of the word &quot;jati&quot;. It is very clear by the Pali suttas as well as commentary such as the Visuddhimagga the word &quot;jati&quot; has numerous different contextual meanings and ultimately does not have the core meaning of &quot;reincarnation&quot;, let alone &quot;physical birth&quot;. The simplest example is the use of the word &quot;jātiyā&quot; in MN 86; kiṃjātiko found in many suttas; or the common use of the verb &quot;jāyati&quot; to refer to coming to be of mental phenomena, such as love, sorrow, rapture, etc.</p>
</li>
<li><p>In the words commonly translations of &quot;rebirth&quot;, the words &quot;jati&quot;, &quot;janati&quot; or &quot;jayati&quot;, which have the root &quot;jan&quot;, are generally not found. Instead, the words commonly translated as &quot;rebirth&quot; are based in the root &quot;pad&quot; rather than &quot;jan&quot;.</p>
</li>
<li><p>However, there is the word &quot;paccājāyati&quot; (which does not include &quot;puna&quot;) however this is rarely used and an investigation of it may find it does not mean &quot;reincarnation&quot; but, instead, &quot;reclassification&quot;. &quot;Paccājāyati&quot; appears to be found in the context about the status of a &quot;jati&quot;, such as &quot;human&quot;, &quot;god&quot;, &quot;ghost&quot;, &quot;animal&quot;, etc, rather than is used to describe the destinations or results of kamma, the later being by far the most common context where the translation &quot;rebirth&quot; is used. Here, in respect to kammic inheritance, words rooted in &quot;pad&quot; (such as &quot;upapajjati&quot;, &quot;upapanna&quot;, etc) are most commonly found. Note: MN 148 clearly shows the word &quot;upapajjati&quot; does not literally have any connection to &quot;reincarnation&quot; but merely means &quot;<em>to follow from the former</em>&quot;.</p>
</li>
<li><p>As for the word &quot;bhava&quot;, this is one of the three &quot;asava&quot; (&quot;mental outflows&quot;; together with sensuality and ignorance). It is obviously very wrong to say &quot;bhava&quot; means &quot;reincarnation&quot; because &quot;bhava&quot; is simply and literally a state of mind. For example, MN 44 says &quot;bhava&quot; is a cause of &quot;identity&quot;. MN 121 says &quot;bhava&quot; is a &quot;perception&quot;.</p>
</li>
</ol>
 16297: <p>Good question, well thought out and described in detail. Your proposal 're-becoming' may be better than the other words, at not implying an immutable soul underlying, compared to 're-birth' and 're-incarnation', 'transmigration', etc.</p>
<p>But it has its problems as well. The biggest one being that it doesn't easily convey you're talking about rebecoming after a physical death.</p>
<p>In the end, it comes down to what people agree on for a convention, or official dictionary definition. Theravadans usually prefer 'rebirth' over 'reincarnation' and the other words. Originally in the dictionary, 'rebirth' didn't even have to do with physical death and what happens after. That's probably why Theravadins chose 'rebirth' over the more widely used 'reincarnation', and other words.</p>
<p>Now that the Buddhist idea of 'rebirth' is in some dictionaries, it seems to be more commonly understood in Theravadin Buddhist context does not entail a permanent soul underlying. Other religions though, like Hinduism, use 'rebirth', 'reincarnation', with a soul/atta.</p>
<p>As long as the convention ('rebirth' in this case) is basically well understood, it's best to stick with it, otherwise you'll waste a lot of time having to explain to people what your new word means exactly.</p>
<p>The time to abandon words, is when it suddenly achieves wide adoption with a completely different and wrong meaning (compared to the original). For example, 'gay' used to mean 'happy and joyful', but once the common definition became 'homosexual', then you have to respect convention and change to a different word or risk being misunderstood.</p>
 471: <p><a href="https://suttacentral.net/dhp146-156/pli/ms" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Dhammapada 153 - 154</a> in Pali:</p>
<blockquote>
<p><em>Anekajātisaṃsāraṃ,</em><br />
<em>sandhāvissaṃ anibbisaṃ;</em><br />
<em>Gahakāraṃ gavesanto,</em><br />
<em>dukkhā jāti punappunaṃ.</em><br />
<em>Gahakāraka diṭṭhosi,</em></p>
<p><em>puna gehaṃ na kāhasi;</em><br />
<em>Sabbā te phāsukā bhaggā,</em><br />
<em>gahakūṭaṃ visaṅkhataṃ;</em><br />
<em>Visaṅkhāragataṃ cittaṃ,</em><br />
<em>taṇhānaṃ khayamajjhagā.</em></p>
</blockquote>
<p>Translation of <a href="https://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/kn/dhp/dhp.11.budd.html#dhp-153" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Dhammapada 153 - 154</a> by Ven. Buddharakkhita:</p>
<blockquote>
<ol start="153">
<li><p>Through many a birth in samsara have I wandered in vain,
seeking the builder of this house (of life). Repeated birth is indeed
suffering!</p>
</li>
<li><p>O house-builder, you are seen! You will not build this house again.
For your rafters are broken and your ridgepole shattered. My
mind has reached the Unconditioned; I have attained the destruction of
craving.</p>
</li>
</ol>
</blockquote>
<p>Repeated birth here is &quot;<em>jāti punappunaṃ</em>&quot;.</p>
<p>From Ven. Nyanatiloka's <a href="https://dictionary.sutta.org/browse/j/j%C4%81ti/" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Pali dictionary entry on &quot;<em>jāti</em>&quot;</a>:</p>
<blockquote>
<p><em>jāti</em>：'birth'，comprises the entire embryonic process beginning with conception and ending with parturition．</p>
<p>＂The birth of beings belonging to this or that order of beings，their
being born，their conception （<em>okkanti</em>） and springing into
existence，<strong>the manifestation of the groups
（corporeality，feeling，perception，mental formations，consciousness；
s．<em>khandha</em>）</strong>，the acquiring of their sensitive organs：this is called
birth＂ （D．22）．For its conditioning by the prenatal kamma-process
（<em>kamma-bhava</em>； s．<em>bhava</em>），s．<em>paṭiccasamuppāda</em> （9，10），<em>paṭisandhi</em>．</p>
</blockquote>
<p>One of Wisdomlib's entries on <a href="https://www.wisdomlib.org/definition/jati#theravada" rel="nofollow noreferrer"><em>jāti</em></a> states:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Jati or jata means arising or coming up.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>The <a href="https://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/kn/dhp/dhp.intro.budd.html#fn-13" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Dhp 154 commentary</a> by Ven. Buddharakkhita states:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>According to the (traditional) commentary, these verses are the
Buddha's &quot;Song of Victory,&quot; his first utterance after his
Enlightenment. <strong>The house is individualized existence in samsara</strong>,
the house-builder craving, the
rafters the passions and the ridge-pole ignorance.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>From these, and from other references on clinging aggregates (<a href="https://suttacentral.net/sn22.48/en/bodhi" rel="nofollow noreferrer">SN 22.48</a>) and Nibbana-element with residue remaining (<a href="https://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/kn/iti/iti.2.042-049x.irel.html#iti-044" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Iti 44</a>), my take on this is that &quot;birth&quot; simply means the arising of one's individuality (the self, the music of the <a href="https://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/sn/sn35/sn35.205.than.html" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Vina Sutta</a>), based on the operation of the five clinging aggregates (the lute) working together in the way described by dependent origination.</p>
<p>And repeated birth refers to repeated occurrences of this, sustained by craving as described in <a href="https://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/sn/sn44/sn44.009.than.html" rel="nofollow noreferrer">SN 44.9</a>.</p>
<p>Ven. Buddharakkhita's commentary above supports this.</p>
<hr />
<p>Another interesting fact is that in some suttas like <a href="https://www.accesstoinsight.org/tipitaka/an/an05/an05.028.than.html" rel="nofollow noreferrer">AN 5.28</a>, &quot;past lives&quot; is the usual translation for &quot;<em>pubbenivāsaṃ</em>&quot;, which literally means &quot;previous homes&quot;. &quot;Homes&quot; and &quot;houses&quot;  (from Dhp 154) sound similar, don't you think?</p>
 43: <p>In suttas Buddha uses two kinds of language. One language employs worldly concepts such as rebirth. Another language introduces technical concepts such as Dependent Origination.</p>
<p>The first type of language is very simplistic and is meant for beginners, the technical language is much more precise and is meant for advanced students.</p>
