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Isn't the first of the four noble truths just obvious?
I'm wondering if I'm missing something about the significance of the first of the four noble truths. Truths 2 through 4 made me sit up and think, and made me want to explore this whole Buddhist thing. But truth 1 *seems* like motherhood and apple pie. "Suffering exists"? Well, duh. In fact, as far as I can see, nothing would be lost if there had just been The Three Noble Truths (i.e. FNT 2-4).
So, I'm wondering if I'm missing some deeper significance in truth 1. Am I wrong to see the existence of suffering as something obvious and so in your face as to be hardly worth pointing out?
Maybe another way to ask it is, is there anyone out there who read the first truth and thought (as I did with 2 through 4) "Wow, now that's new!"
thx.
So, I'm wondering if I'm missing some deeper significance in truth 1. Am I wrong to see the existence of suffering as something obvious and so in your face as to be hardly worth pointing out?
Maybe another way to ask it is, is there anyone out there who read the first truth and thought (as I did with 2 through 4) "Wow, now that's new!"
thx.
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Personally, I can't think of anyone I have ever known, even the most positive and optimistic, who would say they needed Buddhism's first noble truth to tell them suffering exists.
Shrug. Maybe I've just missed meeting all the others who'd say suffering is non-existent.
The Truths are structured as a medical diagnosis, the cause of the illness, the cure, and the way to administer the cure.
Dukkha is the illness. Suffering.
Tanha is the cause. Craving.
Nirvana is the cure. Cessation of that very Craving.
...and the Noble Eightfold Path is the way to realize Nirvana.
Before you can get rid of dukkha, you must establish its existence.
What's your take on it?
Tell me how you define suffering as the 1st of 4 Noble Truths....
(I personally feel there are just three.... we don't need a number 3: I think 3 & 4 could be combined without any discernible loss to the Nobility....)
but I'd like to know your take on numero uno.....
1. See suffering -- things like fear, physical pain, ... -- you're not imagining them people. They're real.
It's almost like the Buddha was reassuring us. Like he's saying, "Don't let anyone fool you by pretending the suffering thing is just an illusion. You're not deluded -- suffering really does exist".
I guess what I'm wondering is, was it maybe the prevailing religious view at the time (maybe in Hinduism back then) that suffering *was* illusory. Maybe that was the way people tried to deal with it back then. That could make sense because in order for the Buddha to move us onto truths 2 through 4, first he has to deactivate what is essentially a falsehood, namely: "Suffering does *not* exist".
That's the only way I can see #1 being significant.
On combining the others, I think I agree. But not 3 and 4, rather 2 and 3. If this were maths, we could have:
2. Attachment => Suffering (i.e. Suffering if Attachment)
3. Non-attachment => Non-suffering (i.e. Non-suffering if Non-Attachment)
Those could be combined into a single:
2/3. Attachment <=> Suffering (i.e. Suffering if-and-only-if Attachment)
But 4 is distinct and new. My dialog with the Buddha would have gone like this:
Buddha: Suffering exists
Me: Cool! I *knew* it! Folk kept telling me I was imagining things but I *knew* I wasn't!
Buddha: Suffering is caused by attachment
Me: Eh?
Buddha: Attachment. To desire. That's the cause.
Me: Wow, that's radical. But fair enough. And so let me ask you ... if I wanted to stop the suffering could I just...
Buddha: Yep. Stop the attachment.
Me: Seriously? That's all there is to it.
Buddha: Welllll ... yah... but ...
Me: Really!? I just stop being attached to desire and suffering stops!!?
Buddha: Yep, exactly.
Me: Cool.
Buddha: [waits]
Me: Wow. That's so cool. Excellent dude. You've made my day.
Buddha: [smiles and waits]
[waits]
[waits]
Me: Hang on!
Buddha: [smiles] Uhu?
Me: How the hell do I stop being attached to desire??
Buddha: OK, so here's what I just figured out. There's this eight-fold path thing. It's really cool, and it goes like this ....
[Buddha and me exit, Buddha's arm over my shoulder as he continues his exposition]
I won't tell you Truth 1, which is what the hell is wrong with you. So, I proceed to Truth 2, which is that there is a cause for what is affecting you; Truth 3, you can be cured; and Truth 4, the method to cure you is kick your silly butt. What is so obvious may not be as simple as you think. If the fact of pervasive suffering is not worth mentioning, then there is an implied resignation to a horrid human condition that has no cure. Everyone accepts suffering but not the Buddha. Everyone accepts death but not the Buddha. To whom suffering is not a given, its existence is an abomination and he won't say "duh, tell me something I don't know". When I read the first truth, I thought, "Wow, that's new. For the first time someone saw that shit, point it out and realized the need to cleaned it up."
"You're in pain"
To which my reply could be:
"No shit Sherlock. I knew that. I told *you* that"
The full analogy is:
1. You are in pain
2. The cause is X
3. If we remove X the pain will go away
4. Here's what we are going to do do remove X
The only way I can see that 1 is useful is if the statement:
"You are *not* in pain"
is something I may have been confused into believing.
Otherwise it seems to verge on a tautology -- like, "All squares have four sides". (OK, yes, FNT #1 is *not* tautological. But my point remains.)
Does this help?
Suffering is the problem that we're trying to get over
Craving is the root cause of our suffering
The ending of craving is the cure (Nirvana)
The Noble Eightfold Path is how we obtain the cure
There's no greater reason required. That's how this formula goes!
Here's one source, from http://www.buddhanet.net/fundbud4.htm:
1. You have a strep throat, caused by
2. The streptococcus virus, so we have to
3. Remove the virus, through
4. A cycle of antibiotics.
Yes you have a sore throat, but you never did realize that it was strep throat. Buddha saw we are all afflicted, but due to the conditioning of our lives, we do not realize that we are suffering all the time.
Well, 1 is a statement of the illness itself. And clearly -- since Diagnosis and Cause are already allocated to Truth 2 -- illness is the symptom, the pain, suffering etc.
And there's my difficulty (and the dead horse I appear to be flogging). Suppose I go to a doctor and say, "I have pain" and he asks me for $100 for each of the following four pieces of wisdom:
1. You have pain
2. The cause of pain is inflammation caused by an infection in your throat
3. The cure is to kill the infection thereby removing the inflamation
4. The treatment is to take one of these antibiotic tablets four times a day for a week
I am fine to pay him for points 2 through 4, but he's getting nothing for point 1. He provided no value in stating it. I already knew.
But with the actual Four Noble Truths, I'm more hesitant. I'm thinking, this Buddha dude came up with some pretty heavy stuff. Sometimes it appears simple, or obvious, but when you dig down, you realize it's profound. Therefore, since the first noble truth appears simple and obvious, I conclude that I need to keep digging.
What I'm hearing (from you and others) is, nah, it's just how they spoke back then. It really is just simple and obvious. No need to dig.
I don't buy it. This is, after all, the *FIRST* *NOBLE* *TRUTH*! I'm missing something. I'm definitely missing something. And perhaps I'm not alone.
I told you -- I'm missing something!
But I suspect there's more to it than that. He'd have been laughed off the street by most "ordinary" people if he was merely telling them what they all already knew.
You have to remember that you have to go to the root of the problem. The inflammation is not the problem. Infection is the problem. Get rid of the infection and the rest will naturally fall into place.
Similarly the Buddha taught that suffering is not the problem. Clinging and aversion are the problems. Get rid of them and the rest will naturally fall into place.
Like we all have said, we all suffer. Just that we don't realize we're suffering. Ever thought about "the good 'ol times"? Ever caught yourself thinking "How I wish we'd go back to when it was so much simpler to live"? That's suffering.
i view the 1st Noble Truth as a gradual teaching & as a diagnosis
for me, it begins with listing those experiences that are ordinarily taken to be suffering by the ordinary person, such as giving birth to children [painful, dangerous], sickness, aging, death, sorrow, pain, etc, separation from the loved, not getting what one wants, etc
this is the same as when an ordinary person goes to a doctor to report their illness. they say to the doctor: "i have pain here, burning here, etc". the doctor, who is enlightened about medicine, says to the ordinary person: "you suffer from xmiximitosis"
the Buddha was the same. As the enlightened spiritual doctor, he said: "in summary, you suffer from clinging to the five aggregates as 'I' and 'mine'..."
just my opinion
regards
1 Dukkha-dukkhata :
Suffering of the mind and body in ordinary sense includes pain, etc
2 Viparinama-dukkhata :
Dukkha cause by change or transience or separation.
3 Sankhara-dukkhata:
Suffering of the Aggregates, state of dis-ease and instability,
Cran,
To realise no. 3, try sitting still in one spot without moving. Very soon you would change to a more comfortable posture. What you don't realize is that there is never a comfortable posture. Even in your sleep you need to change position. From birth to death there is this sense of dis-sease impinging without an end.
In my mind, this is just the Commentary interpretation.
Dukkha-dukkhata = pain or dukkha vedana
Viparinama-dukkhata: dukkha lakana (characteristic), associated with impermanence or transience
Sankhara-dukkhata: suffering of attachment, that is, mental "concocting"
Only sankhara-dukkhata is real dukkha
Regards
SN 38.14 Dukkha Sutta: Stress
translated from the Pali by Thanissaro Bhikkhu
"There are these three forms of stressfulness, my friend: the stressfulness of pain, the stressfulness of fabrication, the stressfulness of change. These are the three forms of stressfulness."
P
So let's take a look at how other religions define the problem. According to Judaism, the problem is that we disobey God's many commandments. According to Christianity, the problem is that we don't accept Christ as our Lord and Savior. According to the Muslims, the problem is that we don't surrender to God and follow the divine teachings of Muhammad. Why suffering exists is not even addressed. It is assumed to be either God's will or the fault of Satan.
So while the existance of suffering is obvious, placing it front and center and declaring the elimination of suffering here and now is what our religion is all about is unique. None of the other religions can afford to make that claim, because they start with an assumption that religion is all about appeasing a God in some form or another. None of them have a cure for suffering, only a promise of a Heaven or end to suffering after this life.
You're right. If we compare the Four Noble Truths with the Ten Commandments, for example, we do indeed get a flavour of what their respective religions consider to be "front and center" as you put it.
c
For example: "I have a lot of money, therefore I'm not suffering because I'm happy to have a lot of money". When in fact the truth is that reliance on, or attachment to, money, is itself, suffering or Dukka. But money is just one example, it could be anything really. This is how I see it.
I would say yes, really. If you have reliance on money, to get happiness, and someone steals all your money, would there be unhappiness? I think that is a guarantee. The problem is, one day all your money is going to be stolen and there is absolutely nothing you can do to stop it. It's not possible to have money and all the things that it brings when you're dead. The result of that is a guaranteed unhappiness IMO. By being reliant on money, you are setting up the conditions that guarantee that suffering will occur because it is a guarantee that this money will be stolen one day.
So the point of the first noble truth isn't just that there's suffering in life, it's that there's suffering in life and it needs to be fully comprehended before it can be cured. I think Thanissaro Bhikkhu gives another good reason as to why they're presented as a group in his study guide on the four noble truths:
"Your money will not be stolen"
How can you possess money if you are dead? What good is a bank if you can't use it anymore? How do you make deposits and withdraws from a bank, when you're dead? It's is a guarantee that your money will be stolen because is is a guarantee that you will lose your life. You can't have money without a life. It's not possible.
Are you trying to say that clinging and attachment does not cause suffering? That is not going to go over very well on a Buddhist forum, since it is one of the fundamental teachings of Buddhism.
Here's a good site with detailed explanations of all the 4NT's: http://www.buddhanet.net/4noble.htm
May be helpful.
But the reason I began this thread is precisely because I suspect that Truth 1 is *not* obvious, it must therefore mean more than I think. The fact that the Dalai Lama wrote a whole book about it backs that up and suggests that he too, in his "...we have suffering" was beginning to peel back layers on something important.
But maybe revkusala gets it right when he says "words fall way too short". There are shades here of the early Wittgenstein with the dichotomy between showing and saying. Here, perhaps some things cannot be said and instead only experienced. To paraphrase Wittgenstein, "Whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must meditate" :-)
about 'five aggregates', 'five clinging aggregates', 'six sense bases', 'six elements', and ' dependent origination'
and
then
contemplate on them
I am 100% sure. I have already interpreted this sutta in my post.
We seem to be stuck on this ambiguous translation rather than reality. Best we look into our mind & heart rather than getting stuck on Thanissaro's bizzare translation.
If we do not understand this matter, we understand absolutely nothing about Buddhism. Nil.
The Buddha advised in countless discourses, the end of suffering is the cessation of craving & attachment and not the cessation of feelings.
If we have not realised this, in relation to the Buddha's core emphasis, we have realised nothing. The Buddha's teaching are in vain.
All the best
they are the five aggregrates subject to clinging or the five aggregates the mind clings to or the five groups/focuses of clinging/identification
they are not the 'five clinging aggregates'
kind regards
How do I get this? Be free of all wants and desires.
To know suffering means you have experienced and understood the root cause of samsara.
The 3rd noble truth means you have experienced and understood the root cause of nirvana.
P
P