The 4 Noble Truths of Suffering = dukkha

(Dukkha meaning distress, sorrow, suffering,

ill, dissatisfaction and so on)

Note: Both the Pali term dukkha and its English equivalents: suffering, sorrow, distress and so on are all metaphors, in other words, high-level language (i.e. user friendly) messages (or icons) that do not accurately describe the low-level (user unfriendly) processes (or medium) they represent. This is crucial. Buddhist communication (i.e. discourse) is fundamentally metaphoric, hence wholly inaccurate, locally (i.e. superficially) useful but actually (i.e. fundamentally) meaningless. This point is made in the Diamond Sutra.

Old Buddhism

New Buddhism

‘This, O bhikkhus, is the Noble Truth of Suffering: birth is suffering; decay is suffering; illness is suffering; death is suffering. Presence of objects we hate is suffering; separation from objects we love is suffering; not to obtain what we desire is suffering. Briefly, the fivefold clinging to existence is suffering.’ ‘This, O bhikkhus, is the Noble Truth of the Cause of Suffering: craving that leads to re-birth, accompanied by pleasure and lust, finding its delight here and there. This craving is threefold, namely, craving for pleasure, craving for existence, craving for prosperity.’ ‘This, O bhikkhus, is the Noble Truth of the Cessation of Suffering: (it ceases with) the complete cessation of this craving - a cessation which consists in the absence of every passion - with the abandoning of this craving, with the doing-away with it, with the deliverance from it, with the destruction of craving.’ ‘This, O bhikkhus, is the Noble Truth of the Path which leads to the Cessation of Suffering: that holy eightfold path, that is to say, right belief, right aspiration, right speech, right conduct, right means of livelihood, right endeavour, right memory, right meditation. See: The expanded list of causes of suffering A Critique of the 4 Noble Truths schedule

1^st part 1. There is distress (i.e. unrest, responded to with suffering and so on) 2. It is caused by (clinging to) arising (to wit: samsara ≈ life). 3. There is an end to distress. 4. The end is attained by achieving cessation (of clinging) (to wit: the deathless, i.e. by non-arising or suppression of clinging to arising). 2^nd part 1. There is distress (suffering and so on). 2. It is caused by dependence (non-freedom). 3. There is an end to distress. 4. The end is attained by achieving freedom from dependence, i.e. either by achieving independence or by not clinging. The most commonly experienced version reads: 1. There is distress, suffering and so on. 2. It is caused by dissatisfaction (due to transience and dependency). 3. There is an end to distress 4. The end is attained by achieving satisfaction (i.e. fulfilment and so on). An alternate version of the 4 Noble Buddhist Truths read: 1. There is distress etc.,. 2. It is caused by craving for what is impermanent and not-own (i.e. one’s self or any thing) 3. There is an end to distress. 4. The attainment (or recovery) not craving (to the notion of permanent ownership (hence of one’s true self ≈ atta or atma or of any thing). See: The 3 characteristics sutta

All of Buddhist theory and practice down the ages, and which evolved through the 5 major schools and scores of sects in the whole of Asia, can be understood as attempts at inventing (indeed, differentiating) ever more comprehensive and sophisticated (indeed, fanciful) and often populist means of (read: products for) resolving (i.e. ending) the personal response to the fundamental problem of transience and dependence (i.e. of non-self-ownership), to wit: of an’atta, thereby eliminating suffering, sorrow, distress and so on (Pali: dukkha). The evolution of Buddhism turned it into one of the most successful MENTAL HEALTH CARE SYSTEMS of antiquity.

Note: It is regrettable that the Buddhist intelligentsia like Nagasena, Nagarjuna, Vasubandhu, the author of the Lotus Sutra, Tsong Khapa and others applied their undoubted intellectual talents to generating prodigious amounts of metaphysical gobbledegook rather than do the really hard sell job of upgrading the understanding of transience (i.e. of anicca) and of dependence (i.e. non-self-ownership ≈ anatta) and restating – which modern metaphors – the 4 Noble Truths that attempt to eliminate the consequences of and their affect upon the individual who craves the transient and dependent. Had any one of them done that he might have become a sam-Buddha in his own right.

The Fuzz word: dukkha

Dukkha as Basic Guide & Control System

Buddhist Topics