[2][3] Cognates (Sanskrit: आत्मन्) ātman, Pāli atta, Old English æthm, and German Atem derive from the Indo-European root *ēt-men (breath).
[5][6] The term Ātman is synonymous with Tuma, Atuma and Attan in early Buddhist literature, state Rhys David and William Stede, all in the sense of "self, soul".
[10][11][12] The early Buddhist literature explores the validity of the Upanishadic concepts of self and Self, then asserts that every living being has an impermanent self but there is no real Higher Self.
[16] Instead, the Buddha explains the perceived continuity of the human personality by describing it as composed of five skandhas, without a permanent entity (Self, soul).
Most scholars consider the Tathagatagarbha doctrine in Mahāparinirvāṇa Sūtra asserting an 'essential nature' in every living being is equivalent to 'Self',[note 4] and it contradicts the Anatta doctrines in a vast majority of Buddhist texts, leading scholars to posit that the Tathagatagarbha Sutras were written to promote Buddhism to non-Buddhists.
[28] According to King, the sutra is rather unsystematic,[28] which made it "a fruitful one for later students and commentators, who were obliged to create their own order and bring it to the text".
Any phenomenon [dharma] that is true [satya], real [tattva], eternal [nitya], sovereign/ autonomous/ self-governing [aisvarya], and whose ground/ foundation is unchanging [asraya-aviparinama], is termed ’the Self ’ [atman].
[37] The Ratnagotravibhāga (also known as Uttaratantra), another text composed in the first half of 1st millennium CE and translated into Chinese in 511 CE, points out that the teaching of the Tathagatagarbha doctrine is intended to win sentient beings over to abandoning "self-love" (atma-sneha) – considered to be a moral defect in Buddhism.
[44] French religion writer André Migot also states that original Buddhism may not have taught a complete absence of self, pointing to evidence presented by Buddhist and Pali scholars Jean Przyluski and Caroline Rhys Davids that early Buddhism generally believed in a self, making Buddhist schools that admit an existence of a "self" not heretical, but conservative, adhering to ancient beliefs.
[45] In his book, The Atman-Brahman in Ancient Buddhism, scholar Kamaleswar Bhattacharya wrote that, while Shakyamuni Buddha did indeed teach against a permanent self within the ever-changing aggregates, both he and early Buddhists believed in an impersonal, universal atman.
[49] The Dhammakaya Movement teaching that nirvana is atta, or true self, was criticized as heretical in Buddhism in 1994 by Ven.
He points to the experiences of prominent forest hermit monks such as Luang Pu Sodh and Ajahn Mun to support the notion of a "true self".
Ajahn Maha Bua, a well known meditation master, described the citta (mind) as being an indestructible reality that does not fall under anattā.
[55] American monk Thanissaro Bhikkhu of the Thai Forest Tradition describes the Buddha's statements on non-self as a path to awakening rather than a universal truth.
[60][59] Thanissaro Bhikkhu points to the Ananda Sutta (SN 44.10), where the Buddha stays silent when asked whether there is a 'self' or not,[61] as a major cause of the dispute.