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Four Noble Truths and The Noble Eightfold Path First Noble Truth: We all suffer. Second Noble Truth: There is a cause of Suffering. The cause is unhealthy craving. Third Noble Truth: There is a Way to End Suffering called Dhamma-Dharma- Pada- Path of Righteous Living Fourth Noble Truths: Walk on The Eightfold Path Consistently. The eight parts of liberation are grouped into three essential elements of Buddhist practice- moral or ethical conduct( (sila) , mental discipline (samadhi), and wisdom (panna). Ethical conduct is based on the vast conception of universal love and compassion for all beings. Here compassion (karuna) represents love, charity, kindness, tolerance-the qualities of the noble heart. While wisdom (panna) stands for the intellectual qualities of the mind, one should not be a good-hearted fool or a hard-hearted intellect. To be perfect one has to develop both head and heart equally. The Noble Eightfold Path:
They are to be developed simultaneously. They are linked together and each helps the cultivation of the others. The eightfold noble path is a way of life to be followed, practiced and developed by each individual. It is self-discipline in body, word, and mind, self-development, and self-purification. It has nothing to do with belief, prayer, worship, or ceremony. In that sense, it has nothing to do which is popularly called religious. It is a Path leading to complete freedom, happiness, and peace through moral, spiritual, and intellectual perfection. Four Noble Truths: 1. The Truth of Dukkha: The truth of suffering and dissatisfaction. There are different kinds of suffering, birth, aging, sickness and death-janma, jara,vyadhi and mrityu; not getting what we want 2. Cause of Suffering is the second Noble Truth. It is tannah, craving, desiring, wanting or greed. Craving for things that we want and getting rid of things we don’t want. Craving for materially, mentally, emotionally, relationally and spiritually: craving for permanancy, and stability. We suffer when our desires do not match reality. Origin of suffering is our mental state, craving (raga), abhorrence or aversion (dwesha) and ignoring (agnana). 3. The Third Noble Truth. Cessation of dukkha, suffering. There is a way, an alternative to end suffering. Suffering can be extinguished if we remove the cause. To quote the Buddha: “ Cession of suffering , as a noble truth is this: It is remainderless, fading and ceasing, giving up, relinquishing, letting go and rejecting of that craving.” If we let go of craving, we can extinguish the fire of our suffering. The fire is burning in our mind. It is mental fire. We must train our mind in a different way. That is the Fourth Noble Truth. 4. To quote the Buddha: “ The way leading to cessation of suffering , as the noble truth, is this: It is simply the noble eight path, that is to say right view, right intention, right speech, right action, right livelihood, right effort, right mindfulness, right concentration. The Buddha taught that by learning to use our three doors , body, speech and mind skillfully. It would remove a lot of suffering. We can reduce or end our suffering by controlling our body, speech and mind in ways that help others, instead of harming them, and by generating wisdom in our mind, we can end suffering. Therefore, true happiness is achievable through personal endeavor. A question is raised. Are there good wholesome cravings or desires? Desire to live a life of virtue and non-violence, wanting to meditate, to discover peace, and discover what we deeply and truly attain. To learn how to be fully present in the moment. Exercise: What cravings can you identify in your life that might be causing unnecessary suffering? What cravings do you need to let go? Out of the Noble Eightfold Path, which steps you would like to work on? <- Go back to Pragna Paramita
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