Skandha

Skandhas (Sanskrit) or khandhas (Pāḷi) means "heaps, aggregates, collections, groupings, clusters" In Buddhism, it refers to the five aggregates of clinging (Pañcupādānakkhandhā), the five material and mental factors that take part in the perpetual process which creates craving, clinging and aversion. Both the Theravada and Mahayana traditions assert that the nature of all aggregates is intrinsically empty of independent existence and that these aggregates do not constitute a "self" of any kind. The 14th Dalai Lama subscribes to this interpretation. The Pali equivalent word Khandha (sometimes spelled Kkhanda) appears extensively in the Pali canon where, state Rhys Davids and William Stede, it means "bulk of the body, aggregate, heap, material collected into bulk" in one context, "all that is comprised under" in some contexts, and particularly as "the elements or substrata of sensory existence, sensorial aggregates which condition life in any form"