Shortly
after his Awakening, the Buddha delivered his first sermon, in which he laid
out the essential framework upon which all his later teachings were based. This
framework consists of the Four Noble Truths, four fundamental principles of
nature (Dhamma) that emerged from the Buddha’s radically honest and penetrating
assessment of the human condition. He taught these truths not as metaphysical
theories or as articles of faith, but as categories by which we should frame
our direct experience in a way that conduces to Awakening:
Dukkha: suffering,
unsatisfactoriness, discontent, stress;
The cause of dukkha: the cause of this dissatisfaction is
craving (tanha) for sensuality, for states of becoming, and states of no
becoming;
The cessation of dukkha: the relinquishment of that craving;
The path of practice leading to the cessation of dukkha: the
Noble Eightfold Path of right view, right resolve, right speech, right action,
right livelihood, right effort, right mindfulness, and right concentration.
Because of our ignorance (avijja) of these Noble Truths, because
of our inexperience in framing the world in their terms, we remain bound to
samsara, the wearisome cycle of birth, aging, illness, death, and rebirth.
Craving propels this process onward, from one moment to the next and over the
course of countless lifetimes, in accordance with kamma (Skt. karma), the
universal law of cause and effect. According to this immutable law, every
action that one performs in the present moment — whether by body, speech, or
mind itself — eventually bears fruit according to its skillfulness: act in
unskillful and harmful ways and unhappiness is bound to follow; act skillfully
and happiness will ultimately ensue. As long as one remains ignorant of
this principle, one is doomed to an aimless existence: happy one moment, in
despair the next; enjoying one lifetime in heaven, the next in hell.
The Buddha discovered that gaining release from samsara requires
assigning to each of the Noble Truths a specific task: the first Noble Truth is
to be comprehended; the second, abandoned; the third, realized; the fourth,
developed. The full realization of the third Noble Truth paves the way for
Awakening: the end of ignorance, craving, suffering, and kamma itself; the
direct penetration to the transcendent freedom and supreme happiness that
stands as the final goal of all the Buddha’s teachings; the Unconditioned, the
Deathless, Unbinding — Nibbana (Skt. Nirvana).
THE EIGHTFOLD PATH AND THE PRACTICE OF DHAMMA
Because the roots of ignorance are so intimately entwined with
the fabric of the psyche, the unawakened mind is capable of deceiving itself
with breathtaking ingenuity. The solution therefore requires more than simply
being kind, loving, and mindful in the present moment. The practitioner must
equip him- or herself with the expertise to use a range of tools to outwit,
outlast, and eventually uproot the mind’s unskillful tendencies. For example,
the practice of generosity (dana) erodes the heart’s habitual tendencies
towards craving and teaches valuable lessons about the motivations behind, and
the results of, skillful action. The practice of virtue (sila) guards one
against straying wildly off-course and into harm’s way. The cultivation of
goodwill (metta) helps to undermine anger’s seductive grasp. The ten
recollections offer ways to alleviate doubt, bear physical pain with composure,
maintain a healthy sense of self-respect, overcome laziness and complacency,
and restrain oneself from unbridled lust. And there are many more skills to
learn.
The good qualities that emerge and mature from these practices
not only smooth the way for the journey to Nibbana; over time they have the
effect of transforming the practitioner into a more generous, loving,
compassionate, peaceful, and clear-headed member of society. The individual’s
sincere pursuit of Awakening is thus a priceless and timely gift to a world in
desperate need of help.
The Eightfold Path is best understood as a collection of
personal qualities to be developed, rather than as a sequence of steps along a
linear path. The development of right view and right resolve (the factors
classically identified with wisdom and discernment) facilitates the development
of right speech, action, and livelihood (the factors identified with virtue). As virtue develops so do the factors identified with concentration (right
effort, mindfulness, and concentration). Likewise, as concentration matures,
discernment evolves to a still deeper level. And so the process unfolds:
development of one factor fosters development of the next, lifting the
practitioner in an upward spiral of spiritual maturity that eventually
culminates in Awakening.
The long journey to Awakening begins in earnest with the first
tentative stirrings of right view — the discernment by which one recognizes the
validity of the four Noble Truths and the principle of kamma. One begins to see
that one’s future well-being is neither predestined by fate, nor left to the
whims of a divine being or random chance. The responsibility for one’s
happiness rests squarely on one’s own shoulders. Seeing this, one’s spiritual
aims become suddenly clear: to relinquish the habitual unskillful tendencies of
the mind in favor of skillful ones. As this right resolve grows stronger, so
does the heartfelt desire to live a morally upright life, to choose one’s
actions with care.
At this point many followers make the inward commitment to take
the Buddha’s teachings to heart, to become “Buddhist” through the act of taking
refuge in the Triple Gem: the Buddha (both the historical Buddha and one’s own
innate potential for Awakening), the Dhamma (both the Buddha’s teachings and
the ultimate Truth towards which they point), and the Sangha (both the unbroken
monastic lineage that has preserved the teachings since the Buddha’s day, and
all those who have achieved at least some degree of Awakening). With one’s feet
thus planted on solid ground, and with the help of an admirable friend or
teacher (kalyanamitta) to guide the way, one is now well-equipped to proceed
down the Path, following in the footsteps left by the Buddha himself.
Right view and right resolve continue to mature through the
development of the path factors associated with sila, or virtue — namely, right
speech, right action, and right livelihood. These are condensed into a very
practical form in the five precepts, the basic code of ethical conduct to which
every practicing Buddhist subscribes: refraining from killing, stealing, sexual
misconduct, lying, and using intoxicants. Even the monks’ complex code of 227
rules and the nuns’ 311 ultimately have these five basic precepts at their
core.
Having gained a foothold in the purification of one’s outward
behavior through the practice of sila, the essential groundwork has been laid
for delving into the most subtle and transformative aspect of the path:
meditation and the development of samadhi, or concentration. This is spelled
out in detail in the final three path factors: right effort, by which one
learns how to favor skillful qualities of mind over unskillful ones; right
mindfulness, by which one learns to keep one’s attention continually grounded
in the present moment of experience; and right concentration, by which one
learns to immerse the mind so thoroughly and unwaveringly in its meditation
object that it enters jhana, a series of progressively deeper states of mental
and physical tranquillity.
Right mindfulness and right concentration are developed in
tandem through satipatthana (“frames of reference” or “foundations of
mindfulness”), a systematic approach to meditation practice that embraces a
wide range of skills and techniques. Of these practices, mindfulness of the
body (especially mindfulness of breathing) is particularly effective at
bringing into balance the twin qualities of tranquillity (samatha) and insight
(vipassana), or clear-seeing. Through persistent practice, the meditator
becomes more adept at bringing the combined powers of samatha-vipassana to bear
in an exploration of the fundamental nature of mind and body.[14] As the
meditator masters the ability to frame his immediate experience in terms of
anicca (inconstancy), dukkha, and anatta (not-self), even the subtlest
manifestations of these three characteristics of experience are brought into
exquisitely sharp focus. At the same time, the root cause of dukkha — craving —
is relentlessly exposed to the light of awareness. Eventually craving is left
with no place to hide, the entire karmic process that fabricates dukkha
unravels, the eightfold path reaches its noble climax, and the meditator gains,
at long last, his or her first unmistakable glimpse of the Unconditioned —
Nibbana.
This first enlightenment experience, known as stream-entry
(sotapatti), is the first of four progressive stages of Awakening, each of
which entails the irreversible shedding or weakening of several fetters
(samyojana), the manifestations of ignorance that bind a person to the cycle of
birth and death. Stream-entry marks an unprecedented and radical turning point
both in the practitioner’s current life and in the entirety of his or her long
journey in samsara. For it is at this point that any lingering doubts about the
truth of the Buddha’s teachings disappear; it is at this point that any belief
in the purifying efficacy of rites and rituals evaporates; and it is at this
point that the long-cherished notion of an abiding personal “self” falls away.
The stream-enterer is said to be assured of no more than seven future rebirths
(all of them favorable) before eventually attaining full Awakening.
But full Awakening is still a long way off. As the practitioner
presses on with renewed diligence, he or she passes through two more
significant landmarks: once-returning (sakadagati), which is accompanied by the
weakening of the fetters of sensual desire and ill-will, and non-returning
(agati), in which these two fetters are uprooted altogether. The final stage of
Awakening — arahatta — occurs when even the most refined and subtle levels of
craving and conceit are irrevocably extinguished. At this point the
practitioner — now an arahant, or “worthy one” — arrives at the end-point of
the Buddha’s teaching. With ignorance, suffering, stress, and rebirth having
all come to their end, the arahant at last can utter the victory cry first
proclaimed by the Buddha upon his Awakening:
“Birth is ended, the holy life fulfilled, the task done! There
is nothing further for the sake of this world.”
The arahant lives out the remainder of his or her life inwardly
enjoying the bliss of Nibbana, secure at last from the possibility of any
future rebirth. When the arahant’s aeons-long trail of past kamma eventually
unwinds to its end, the arahant dies and he or she enters into parinibbana —
total Unbinding. Although language utterly fails at describing this
extraordinary event, the Buddha likened it to what happens when a fire finally
burns up all its fuel.
“The serious pursuit of happiness”
Buddhism is sometimes naïvely criticized as a “negative” or “pessimistic”
religion and philosophy. Surely life is not all misery and disappointment: it
offers many kinds of happiness and sublime joy. Why then this dreary Buddhist
obsession with unsatisfactoriness and suffering?
The Buddha based his teachings on a frank assessment of our
plight as humans: there is unsatisfactoriness and suffering in the world. No
one can argue this fact. Dukkha lurks behind even the highest forms of worldly
pleasure and joy, for, sooner or later, as surely as night follows day, that
happiness must come to an end. Were the Buddha’s teachings to stop there, we
might indeed regard them as pessimistic and life as utterly hopeless. But, like
a doctor who prescribes a remedy for an illness, the Buddha offers both a hope
(the third Noble Truth) and a cure (the fourth). The Buddha’s teachings thus
give cause for unparalleled optimism and joy. The teachings offer as their reward
the noblest, truest kind of happiness, and give profound value and meaning to
an otherwise grim existence. One modern teacher summed it up well: “Buddhism is
the serious pursuit of happiness.”
Until the late 19th century, the teachings of Theravada were
little known outside of southern Asia, where they had flourished for some two
and one-half millennia. In the past century, however, the West has begun to
take notice of Theravada’s unique spiritual legacy in its teachings of Awakening.
In recent decades this interest has swelled, with the monastic Sangha from
various schools within Theravada establishing dozens of monasteries across
Europe and North America. Increasing numbers of lay meditation centers, founded
and operated independently of the monastic Sangha, strain to meet the demands
of lay men and women — Buddhist and otherwise — seeking to learn selected
aspects of the Buddha’s teachings.
The turn of the 21st century presents both opportunities and
dangers for Theravada in the West: Will the Buddha’s teachings be patiently
studied and put into practice, and allowed to establish deep roots in Western
soil, for the benefit of many generations to come? Will the current popular
Western climate of “openness” and cross-fertilization between spiritual
traditions lead to the emergence of a strong new form of Buddhist practice
unique to the modern era, or will it simply lead to confusion and the dilution
of these priceless teachings? These are open questions; only time will tell.
Spiritual teachings of every description inundate the media and
the marketplace today. Many of today’s popular spiritual teachings borrow
liberally from the Buddha, though only rarely do they place the Buddha’s words
in their true context. Earnest seekers of truth are therefore often faced with
the unsavory task of wading through fragmentary teachings of dubious accuracy.
How are we to make sense of it all?
Fortunately the Buddha left us with some simple guidelines to
help us navigate through this bewildering flood. Whenever you find yourself
questioning the authenticity of a particular teaching, heed well the Buddha’s
advice to his stepmother:
[The teachings that promote] the qualities of which you may
know, ‘These qualities lead to passion, not to dispassion; to being fettered,
not to being unfettered; to accumulating, not to shedding; to
self-aggrandizement, not to modesty; to discontent, not to contentment; to
entanglement, not to seclusion; to laziness, not to aroused persistence; to
being burdensome, not to being unburdensome': You may categorically hold, ‘This
is not the Dhamma, this is not the Vinaya, this is not the Teacher’s
instruction.’
[As for the teachings that promote] the qualities of which you
may know, ‘These qualities lead to dispassion, not to passion; to being
unfettered, not to being fettered; to shedding, not to accumulating; to
modesty, not to self-aggrandizement; to contentment, not to discontent; to
seclusion, not to entanglement; to aroused persistence, not to laziness; to
being unburdensome, not to being burdensome': You may categorically hold, ‘This
is the Dhamma, this is the Vinaya, this is the Teacher’s instruction.’
