The Fourth Noble Truth

Just to summarize, we now know that all life is suffering. This suffering is caused by attachments and desire. Yet, there is a way to end this suffering. To continue our medical analogy, Doctor Buddha, saw the problem, identified the cause, and then prescribed a cure. Today we are going to discuss this cure.

The Fourth Noble Truth is the path (or “Way”) that ends suffering.

This prescription to end suffering is usually called The Eightfold Path, because it has eight steps or components. These eight components are:

1. Right Thought
2. Right Speech
3. Right Actions
4. Right Livelihood
5. Right Understanding
6. Right Effort
7. Right Mindfulness
8. Right Concentration

This path is also sometimes called “The Middle Way” because it goes directly between all opposite concepts. It is the middle way between asceticism and self-indulgence. By focusing on perfecting these eight components, you can attain enlightenment and be released from all suffering. This is what is called attaining Nirvana (or Enlightenment).

“I teach about suffering and the way to end it”
Shakyamuni Buddha

You can probably guess what we’ll be discussing for the next eight days, right? Some of the steps on the eightfold path are intuitively simple, yet hard to put into practice. Others are conceptually complex and take a lifetime of practice to master (if ever).

Now your homework for the weekend. Memorize the four Noble Truths. They’re the heart of Buddhism, and we’ll be discussing them repeatedly. If you have time, memorize the eightfold path as well, as that’s just as crucial. There really isn’t much to memorize in Buddhism, but these two lists are way up there in importance.

The Four Noble Truths

1. All of life is suffering
2. There is a cause to this suffering, desire and attachment
3. There is a path to end this suffering
4. The Eightfold Path is the way to end suffering

Who Was The Buddha?
By “Dr. Arcane”

Around 2500 years ago, King Shuddodana Gautama of the Shakya clan ruled in northern India. He built a great castle and ruled his people well. One night, his wife, Queen Maya, had a strange dream wherein she saw a white elephant enter her womb through the side of her chest. She soon found that she was indeed pregnant. The people of the kingdom were thrilled that there would soon be a royal heir.

Planning to have the child at her parent’s home, Maya traveled there before the birth. On April 8th, on the way to Queen Maya’s ancestral home, she stopped to rest in a garden. Reaching for a blossoming branch in the garden, she suddenly, painlessly, had the child. Unfortunately, a few days later, Queen Maya died.

The baby was named Siddhartha, meaning, ‚ÄúEvery wish fulfilled,‚Äù and was raised within his father’s grand castle. His father, of course, expected young Siddhartha to succeed him as King at some point in the future.

Fate, however, had other plans for Siddhartha. A wandering holy man came to the castle to see the King. He had a vision concerning the young Prince and had to tell the King. He foretold that the young boy had two possible futures; either as a great King who would rule the entire world, or as a great holy man. The King decided immediately that his son would not leave the castle and learn to be the great future King.

Young Siddhartha lived in the castle and grew up inside its protective walls, never seeing anything that would make him think of spiritual or religious things. His father was careful to remove all hints of the real suffering that accompany this world. The Prince lived a perfectly shielded life. His father arranged a marriage, and then Siddhartha had a son of his own. Not long after, on a parade through the city, he spotted three sights. First he saw a sick man. He asked his good friend and charioteer, “Will I become sick?” The charioteer answered truthfully, “Ees, eventually we all get sick.” They continued through the city, and the Prince spotted a very old man. He asked, “Will I grow old like that man?” to which the charioteer answered similarly. Lastly, he saw a dead man being carried away. “Will I die?” he asked, and did not like the answer.

Leaving his wife and son behind, Siddhartha abandoned the castle and went off to live in the wilderness as a wandering holy man. He met up with other ascetic mendicants, refusing to eat, spending all day in meditation and denying all pleasures. For years he studied with the ascetics, and nearly starved to death in the process. After six years studying in this manner, he finally decided that he would learn no more following this path. He decided that denying the world was wrong, but that enjoying life too much, as in his younger days, was ad as well. He decided to follow a “Middle Path.” His friends, the other five mendicants, abandoned him, since he no longer believed as they did.

He then sat beneath a Bodhi tree and meditated. During this meditation, he was tempted in many ways to abandon his search for truth and live a life of pleasure. He rejected every temptation and continued his struggle to know. At last, he succeeded, becoming enlightened under the Bodhi tree, and the world would never be the same for him. At 35 years old, he became a Buddha, one who is “awake.”

He met up with his five mendicant friends, and he quickly convinced them that his path was real, and they became his first followers. He traveled the countryside, teaching his ways, and word quickly spread about this man who taught the Path to Enlightenment. He soon had many thousands of followers. He was eventually reunited with his father, wife and son, and they too, became his followers.

He traveled around teaching for decades, and at around age 80, died from eating some spoiled food. He foresaw his death, but continued teaching as always until the very moment of death. He closed his eyes and in perfect peace, moved on to Nirvana. Stories about his life, his teachings, and his Path were written down and his followers continued to spread the message for the next 2500 years.

Since then, people have known him by many names; Siddhartha, Buddha, Gotama, Shakyamuni, Enlightened One, Tathagata, and many others. Not a god, just a man, but the greatest teacher of all time.

The Other Precepts

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A Reader recently wrote:
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As someone is relatively new to Buddhism, I have read about the sixth precept of not eating untimely meals. What does this mean to a western Buddhist?

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And my response:
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We only talked about FIVE precepts, but depending on your group, there may be more. In some cases, there are as many as several hundred (for new monks).

The sixth precept goes something like this:

In observing the sixth precept, the lay Buddhist eats one or two simple meals between dawn and noon and avoids taking food beyond that. This cuts down the time spent on meals and allows him more time to spend on mediation.

The sixth precept also follows the practice of bhikkhus and aims at cutting down the sloth which is experienced after a day’s work and a substantial evening meal, while it ensures that the body is light and fit for meditative practice. In the precept, the words “outside the time” mean after twelve noon until dawn the following day. During this time no food is eaten. However, some flexibility will be needed here with people going out to work. For them it would mean no food after their midday lunch until breakfast the next day. If one is troubled by tiredness after work on a day when these precepts are undertaken then tea or coffee are allowable as refreshing drinks. If hunger is the trouble then cocoa (or even plain chocolate) should cure it. None of these refreshments should contain milk, which is considered a food, though sugar, honey and butter are allowed (to bhikkhus, and therefore to lay people keeping the Eight Precepts), presumably because one can take only a little of these things. Fruit juices which have been strained (without fruit pulp) are other possible drinks.

And just to head it off before anyone asks, the next two precepts are:

7. I undertake the rule of training to refrain from dancing, singing, music, going to see entertainments, wearing garlands, smartening with perfumes and beautifying with cosmetics.

8. I undertake the rule of training to refrain from a high or large sleeping-place.

Yes, #8 tells us to sleep on a floormat, not on a raised bed. This has some historical meaning as not to try to rise above your station in life. Several times last week we discussed the way Buddhism changes over time concerning science. By the same logic, changing social rules have some impact on Buddhism as well: Do you really get arrogant by sleeping on a raised bed? Remember also, precept #6 was written long before electricity and the ability to stay up long past dark; in many cases, our days are far longer than they were in those days.

If you look back at Thich Nhat Hanh’s version of the 5 precepts, he pretty much covers most of the stuff contained in #7 in his discussion of intoxicants (bad TV, etc). His version also makes more sense. I think there’s a reason TNH went with only the first five precepts.

The question being how do these new precepts affect Westerners? I’d really like to say that they are primarily intended for monks, but they are specifically for laypeople. Instead, I’m going to go way out on a limb and say I don’t follow them, and I feel no guilt whatsoever about ignoring these.

Am I wrong?

Creation and Evolution

Creation occurs repeatedly throughout time in cycles. In the beginning of each cycle, land forms, in darkness, on the surface of the water. Beings who populated the universe in the previous cycle are reborn; some of them become the “new” humans in the new universe. Suffering and misery reigns. That is where we stand today. Eventually, the universe breaks down; all living creatures return to the soul life, and the cycle repeats. This is essentially the same as the Big Bang/Big Crunch theory, only integrating the ideas of reincarnation and karma. This is once again a remnant of Buddhism’s basis in Hinduism. Although there are minor differences in details, most Buddhists believe these essential ideas or something close.

There is no Creator god. There is no “Creation” in the usual Christian-like way of looking at it. Some older Buddhist stories do indeed involve some kind of god or gods making the creation happen. Today, these are generally accepted as symbolic stories and allegories for the more scientific “Big Bang” theory mentioned above.

For the same reasons, most Buddhists also accept the theory of Evolution. Simple life forms evolved and changed until the creatures we know today existed.

As I mentioned in the review of the Dalai Lama’s book a few days ago, he, as well as most Buddhists, accepts scientific thought over Buddhist myths whenever there are conflicting ideas or theories. This is why Buddhism is usually considered the most logical and rational of belief systems.

Bodhisattvas

We all know Buddha achieved his enlightenment and reached Nirvana. But many others have done it as well. Then what? Well, no one knows and we can only speculate on what really happens when a being reaches Nirvana and leaves the cycle of rebirth. However, what happens if a person achieves Enlightenment and chooses NOT to exit the rebirth cycle? This is what the Bodhisattvas have done.

Simply put, a Bodhisattva is a person who has achieved perfect enlightenment, but rather than leave the cycle of rebirth, has chosen to remain behind and help others reach that goal; in a way it’s the ultimate form of self-sacrifice. They have given up their great reward to help others.

Some groups also expand the definition of Bodhisattva to include people who are still seeking enlightenment, but make great efforts to help others. Obviously, this second expanded definition includes many more people. People who choose to can take the Bodhisattva vows. These vows are different for each sect of Buddhism, but the vows for the Zen sect go like this:

I vow to liberate all beings, without number.
I vow to uproot endless blind passions.
I vow to penetrate dharma gates beyond measure.
I vow to attain the way of the Buddha.

“Without number”, “endless”, “beyond measure” … These sound like hyperbole, but they mean it. Remember, by giving up on leaving the cycle of rebirth, they have unlimited lifetimes to accomplish their goal. The goal? To help every living thing in the world achieve enlightenment and to eliminate suffering.

Yama & Naraka: Death and Hell

Yama is the personification of death, or, in the more religious versions of Buddhism, as a the god of the dead. He’s usually depicted with green or red skin, and reigns over Naraka, the Buddhist version of Hell.

Naraka is “hell” for Buddhists. People go to Naraka due to bad karma as a result of their actions. Although they can stay there a long time, their time in “hell” is not permanent. In a way, Naraka may be more comparable to ideas of purgatory than hell, but there are elements of both ideas here. There are also both hot and cold hells involved, so if you are reading about Naraka, you may see references to either hot or cold places.