Lord Buddha set in motion the Wheel of
Dharma with his First Sermon. In his
First Sermon Lord Buddha proclaimed the Dharma, the doctrine of the Buddha and
laid the foundation of Buddha Dharma.
The First Sermon is the First Turning
of the Wheel of Dharma.
In First Sermon, Lord Buddha revealed Four
Noble Truths of existence concerning the meaning of life, and the Noble
Eightfold Noble concerning the right way to live.
In First Sermon, the First Turning of the
Wheel of Dharma, recorded in the Dhammacakkhapavathana Sutta, the first ever
recorded Sutta, Lord Buddha reveals:
There are Four Noble Truths:
1…Suffering: life
is permeated by suffering,
2…Cause of Suffering:
the cause of suffering is attachment, craving and dissatisfaction,
3…Cessation of
Suffering: the cessation of suffering is possible by eliminating all forms of
attachment, craving, and dissatisfaction, and
4…Annihilation
of Suffering: the way to annihilate suffering is the Noble Eightfold Path.
There are eight kinds of suffering
common to all: (1) birth, (2) old age, (3) disease, (4) death, (5) loss of
loved ones or being separated from pleasant, (6) encounter with the detestable
or being united with unpleasant, (7) frustrating ambitions or not having received
what was desired, and (8) ills related to five Skandhas, with which we are made.
The five Skandhas are:
(i) Rupa –form, is
the object of five senses. In physical
form the objects are made up of five great elements: (i) earth, (ii) water,
(iii) air, (iv) fire, and (v) space.
(ii) Vedana -feeling
and sensation. We experience feeling and
sensation through contact of six faculties: sight, sound, taste, smell, bodily
sensation, and mental feeling or sensation, with corresponding objects.
The feeling and
sensation could be pleasant, unpleasant or neutral. Because Vedana is the experience of pleasure
or pain, it conditions craving, either to acquire something pleasurable or
avoid something painful.
(iii) Sanjna -idea
or perception. Sanjna arises with recognising
things. Sanjna is the faculty that
recognises. It conceptualises and
recognises things by drawing inference from the interaction of subject and
object.
Sanjna is what
we call cognition, reasoning, conceptualisation, a thought or an idea.
(iv) Sankhara -volitional
mental formation. Sankhara directs the
mind to do good, bad or neutral activities.
Vedana and
Sanjna, are not volitional actions and they do not produce Karma but Sankhara
produces good or bad Karma.
(v) Vijnana -consciousness. It refers to awareness of something without
recognition or before recognition.
Vijnana is being
aware of something is there or happening.
It is awareness but not recognition.
Recognition is a function of Sanjna, which determines what is there or
happening.
Being Conscious
is simply being aware. Once there is
awareness, Sanjna recognises the object and assign a value to it and Sankhara
reacts with desire or revulsion or some other mental formation.
The aggregation of five Skandhas brings
about our thoughts, feelings, ideas, evaluations and attitudes that filter and
create our experience. They interdependently
co-exist and create the illusion of self, the being of I.
Clinging to illusory self, the being of
I existing independently, means suffering.
Believing on self, the being of I in us, creates Ahangkar -Ego, which bring
about suffering.
Anything that is compounded is
impermanent and clinging onto impermanence brings about suffering.
Suffering occurs at three levels:
1...Suffering due
to being alive and embodied
Body is potentially subject to physical
suffering due to affliction, hardship, hunger, sickness, adverse environmental
conditions, ageing and death. These
kinds of sufferings are inherent to physical body. These are ordinary built-in suffering
inherent to living beings.
2...Suffering due to state of mind
Suffering due to state of mind, called Sankhara,
results from:
i...Not been able to tolerate
disrespect, loss of loved ones, not been able achieve ambitions, encounter with
detestable, and so.
ii...Association with unpleasant
persons and conditions, separation from loved ones and pleasant conditions, not
getting what was desired, and so on.
iii...Harsh speech, anger, doubt, worry,
fear, jealousy, anxiety, and so on.
iv...Delusion, illusion, craving,
clinging, and attachment resulting in ignorance.
3...Suffering due to impermanence and
change
The suffering arises from not being
able to hold onto what we like. The
pleasant and happy feelings or conditions in life are not permanent. Sooner or later they change. When they change with time, they produce
unhappiness, disappointment, pain and suffering.
Time is eternally changing and with
time everything changes and resultant of change could be happiness or suffering
depending upon Karma.
The principal cause of suffering is attachment.
The sources of suffering are: (1)
Kama-Tanha -desire for sense pleasure, (2) Bhava-Tanha -desire to become, and
(3) Vibhava-Tanha -desire to get rid of, aversion.
The desire to have, the desire not to
have, the aversion, and the dissatisfaction with the results of our action are
primary causes of suffering.
Suffering does not arise by itself but
by its causes, and the causal action is Karma.
The three Karma generating sources are
body, speech, and mind.
Our mind generates thought that directs
our action. Our mind manifests in both
negative and positive forms. In negative
form, our mind drives us with desire, anger, hatred, pride, doubt, fear, worry
and all other perverted or deluded views.
The same mind in positive form realises Buddha Nature in our being
embodying love and compassion. Mind is
all powerful and it creates entire experiences.
All the causes and conditions for
unwholesome action are rooted in deluded views and misleading thoughts that
generate untold suffering. The deluded views
steer the nascent thought being generated by our mind in the wrong direction,
which give rise to the misinterpreted and misdirected feelings.
If we dwell on negative thought and
feeling, we will have negative experiences and feel unhappy.
Thinking and acting in a wholesome way results
in happiness. If we cultivate wholesome
thought and feeling, it results in wholesome experiences in our life and we
feel happy.
Grasping and aversion are the two main
driving forces behind how we think and act that taint our actions and lead to
the experiences of suffering.
The lead cause for grasping and
aversion is ignorance giving rise to misleading thought.
The source of ignorance that gives rise
to grasping and aversion leading to suffering is the sense of I, me and mine.
We have instinctive sense of I and me. We think that there is an ‘inner me’ that
experiences our life, the thinker behind our thought. We think that ‘I am' is a singular entity,
one person, who is separate from other people.
So we try to protect our sense of I.
We try to get what we want and push away what we do not want; and this
is where grasping and aversion come from.
We make assumption of permanence. We think the I in me is permanent, but in
reality nothing is permanent. We think
we are separate, but everything is interconnected. This mistaken perception is called
ignorance.
The current life is merely one link in
a chain of lives that extends far into the past and projects far into the
future. The point of origin of this
chain cannot be determined.
We suffer as a result of unfulfilled
desires of our material self, the 'I' in us, we continue to re-born in Samsara,
the continuum of birth, death and rebirth, to resume our pursuit for material
happiness.
It is the manifestation of our mind;
our action and the belief on I in us are the primary causes of suffering.
Suffering can be annihilated. We can end suffering by removing the cause of
suffering. We can erase the cause of
suffering by knowing our true nature.
To be liberated from suffering, the
deluded views and misleading thoughts should be abandoned, and we should be mindful
and involve in virtuous actions.
We should do our rightful duty with
full devotion, and we should not attach ourselves to the result of our Karma, may
it bad or good.
The time we attach ourselves to the
results of our Karma, dissatisfaction arises. We should renounce the results of our Karma
and exercise total detachment from all forms of attachments.
Suffering arises from
dissatisfaction. We can be free from dissatisfaction
with containment.
We should exercise containment and we
must accept and respect the results of our Karma with humility, accept as it
comes and continue to do our karma with devotion, dedication and determination,
with full of loving kindness and compassion, and void of any sense of
expectations.
The virtuous actions result in a state
of happiness, and un-virtuous actions result in suffering.
There are three kinds of actions:
mental, emotional, and physical. If we abandon
all un-virtuous mental, emotional and physical actions, then our actions are
automatically virtuous.
It is a wrong view to believe on self,
the being of I in us having an independent existence. What we consider I is Ahankar –Ego. The Ego give rise to illusion and out of
illusion come craving and clinging and all other negative attitudes.
Ego has no permanent independent entity
and whatever is not independent and permanent is not true. Ego comes in existence as a result of aggregation
of five Skandhas at birth and it disappears when the five Skandhas are
disaggregated at death. The Ego is Anatta
-not-self, and it must be destroyed to come out of illusion, the main cause of
suffering.
Only the absolute is permanent, and
that is truth. That is Dharma Kaya. Anything besides Dharma Kaya is Anicca
-impermanence and has Dependent Origination.
We come out of suffering with the knowledge
of what is impermanent is illusion, and what is permanent is truth.
Every individual existence is in the
process of infinite change. It includes our
body, emotion, mind, and the environment.
To consider what is ever changing and impermanent is not wisdom. But to know it and realise this truth is
wisdom.
When we do not know what wisdom is, there
arise illusion and illusion is the cause of suffering. When we know what wisdom is and realise the
truth, the illusion disappear and so is the suffering.
Look at what is going on in mind and in
our life and the experience of pain and happiness with same state of mind, face
it and accept it. Acceptance means
taking responsibility for our experience and working in a positive and creative
way.
The cycle of birth and death to which
suffering is inbuilt continues to add-infinity and it will continue until Nirvana
is attained.
The root cause of suffering lies in
ignorance in seeking permanence in impermanence.
The way to annihilate suffering is to walk
the Eightfold Noble Path.
When one adopts the Noble Eightfold
Path, the deluded views giving rise to misleading thought are eradicated, and the
right attitude, thought and action are cultivated.
Noble Eightfold Path has three pillars:
(1) Sila -self discipline, the ethical conduct, (2) Samadhi -mental discipline,
and (3) Prajna -wisdom. These are the
three essentials of Dharma.
Self discipline is indispensable for
the development of mental discipline which in turn enables us to cultivate
wisdom to eradicate ignorance being free from Ego that creates illusion and
binds us to Samsara.
Noble Eightfold Path liberates people
from illusion, attachment and ignorance through ethical and mental
development. When one follows Noble
Eightfold Path earnestly there will be gradual development of spiritual way of
life.
Noble Eightfold Path provides a
spiritual road map that shows us the way to live a life with universal human
values.
The Noble Eightfold Path put emphasis
on practice. It is only through practice
one can attain a higher level of existence.
The Noble Eightfold Path consists of:
1...Right Understanding Samma-Drsti
2...Right Thought Samma-Sankalpa
3...Right Speech Samma-Vaca
4...Right Action Samma-Karmanta
5...Right Livelihood Samma-Ajiva
6...Right Effort Samma-Vayama
7...Right Mindfulness Samma-Smrti
8...Right Concentration Samma-Samadhi
The Noble Eightfold Path is not to be
understood in sequence of eight single independent steps. They are highly interdependent principles
that have to be seen in relation to each other.
They have to be embraced simultaneously and successively.
Before going into detail, one needs to
understand the original meaning of Samma.
Samma is a Pali word which in Sanskrit it is Samyak, and it denotes
perfection, completeness and wholeness.
When we say Samma Sam Buddha, we mean Perfectly, Fully and Completely
Enlightened One. The literary
translation of Samma into Right should be understood in this context.
Three pillars of Noble Eightfold Path:
|
Three pillars of Noble Eightfold Path
|
Noble Eightfold Path
|
|
1...Prajna: Wisdom
|
1...Right Understanding
|
|
2...Right Intention
|
|
2...Sila: Ethical Conduct
|
3...Right Speech
|
|
4...Right Action
|
|
5...Right Livelihood
|
|
3...Samadhi: Mental Discipline
|
6...Right Effort
|
|
7...Right Mindfulness
|
|
8...Right Concentration
|
Prajna -the wisdom purifies our mind by
enabling it to gain spiritual insight on the true nature of all that exist.
Prajna has two aspects:
I...
Samma-Drsti: Right Understanding
Right Understanding means to have right
view, right assumption and right perception.
Right Understanding gives us right
direction and motivation. With Right
Understanding we will have Vipassana Panna -perfect insight wisdom and we see
things as they really are and not as they appear to be.
Right Understanding is the cognitive
aspect of wisdom that enables us to see things through, know the impermanent
and imperfect nature of worldly existence, objects and ideas, and understand
the law of Karma.
The world is bondage to attachment and
biases. One who is free from intellectual
and emotional attachment, fixation of awareness, biasness and obsession, and
not resolved on self, see things as they are with right view. Such person understands the Four Noble
Truths, see Dukkha arising and passing away, and never get disturbed.
To have Right Understanding, we need to
train our mind by practicing Samatha and Vipassana meditation supported by
undeterred will power.
Right Understanding is not an
intellectual capacity which only few posses naturally nor intelligence is
wisdom. The Right Understanding is
attained, sustained and enhanced by and through all capacities of mind.
Right Understanding begins with
intuitive insight that all beings are subject to suffering and suffering ends.
Right Understanding
implies to Right Understanding of Buddha Pitaka primarily the Four Noble Truths
and the Noble Eightfold Path.
II...
Samma Sankalpa: Right Thought
Right Understanding leads to Right Thought.
The Right Thought is clear thinking, right intention
and right resolve. It is the intention
of renunciation, goodwill and freedom.
Right Thought implies to divine vow with
pure heart and mind. It is the commitment
to ethical and mental purification. It eliminates
evil thoughts and develops pure thoughts.
Right Thought has three folds:
1...Nekkhamma: Renunciation of worldly pleasure and adoption of the
virtue of selflessness, and renunciation of attachment, selfishness, and
possessiveness.
Nekkhamma is the intention
of renunciation, the resistance to the pull of desire.
2...Avyapada: Loving-kindness, goodwill, or benevolence, which are opposed
to hatred, ill-will, or aversion.
Avyapada is the intention of
good will, and the resistance to feeling of anger and aversion.
3...Avihimsa: Harmlessness and compassion, which are opposed to
cruelty and callousness.
Avihimsa is the intention
of harmlessness, not to think or act cruelly, violently, or aggressively, but
to develop compassion instead.
One arrives at pure thought through
repeated reflection on whether the thought that has emerged is free from
ill-will and it is harmlessness, both to oneself and to others.
If a thought is afflicting oneself, or
others or both, one should abandon it.
One should act on thoughts only if it has happy consequences and
happiness results on both, to oneself and others.
Lord Buddha once advised Rahula;
“...therefore, Rahula, you should train yourself by reflecting ‘I will purify
my bodily acts through repeated reflection.
I will purify my verbal acts through repeated reflection. I will purify my mental acts through repeated
reflection.’ This is how you should
train yourself.”
Right Thought is volitional aspect of
wisdom. Right Thought is the energy that
regulates our actions.
Sila means morality, the ethical
conduct that enables us to abstain from unwholesome action.
Prajna and Sila go hand in hand. They complement each other. Sila being simple and practicable by all, everyone
should start practicing Dharma with Sila.
Sila has three aspects:
I...Right
Speech: Samma Vaca
The Right Thought leads to Right Speech.
Right Speech means speaking truth with
humility. It means abstinence from lying,
slandering, abusive, divisive, and harsh words, indecency, and frivolous or
idle talk.
Five fundamentals of Right Speech are: (1)
spoken at right time; (2) the truth is spoken; (3) spoken affectionately; (4) spoken
beneficially, and (5) spoken with good-will.
A well spoken speech should neither
harm oneself nor others. One should
establish within oneself; “Am I one who practice purity in speech, flawless and
untainted?”
One should always
investigate five conditions within oneself: (1) do I speak at right time, or
not? (2) do I speak truth, or not? (3) do I speak gently or harshly? (4) do I
speak beneficial words or not? and (5) do I speak from kind heart with goodwill
or inwardly malicious?
Right Speech is the first principle of
ethical conduct.
II...Right
Action: - Samma
Karmanta
Right Action follows Right Speech. Right Action refers to action that involve bodily
action, which should benefit others and in no way harm others.
All sentient beings, nature and
environment should be respected. Selfless
help should be extended voluntarily to needy poor and distressed sentient
beings with right attitude.
Every action we should demonstrate right
attitude, manner and discipline.
The unwholesome action leads to unsound
state of mind, while wholesome action leads to sound state of mind.
Right Action means one should execute action
with dedication, right attitude, integrity, confidence and will power. The action should be void of intent and Ego-led
motivation and one should renunciation of results on one's action.
One should
revere and adhere to Panch Sila -the five moralities of Buddha Dharma with
highest integrity.
III...Right
Livelihood: Samma Ajiva
The Right Speech and Right Action leads
to Right Livelihood.
Right Livelihood means one should earn
one’s living in a righteous manner, with integrity and free from corruption,
and without harming others. One's action
should not cause destruction of nature and pollution of environment.
Wealth should be gained legally and
peacefully in a mutually beneficial manner.
The spiritual pilgrims should endeavour
to purify their livelihood by refraining from five kinds of trade: (i) animals
for slaughter, (ii) intoxicating drinks and drugs, (iii) poisons, (iv) arms,
and (v) human trafficking. These are forbidden
actions.
Right Livelihood means living a
virtuous life. It means extending love
and compassion without harming or causing injustice to others, and without
compromising with any of the Panch Sila, being aware of Karma -the consequences
of one’s action on others and reciprocal impact on oneself.
Samadhi is mental discipline. Samadhi delivers mental purification and it is
inevitable to calm fleeting mind.
Samadhi is the culminating state of meditative
process resulting in complete absorption, a state of bliss.
Samadhi has three aspects:
I...Right
Effort: Samma Vayama
Right Effort refers to mental
development, cultivating right attitudes.
It is an act of will without which nothing can be achieved.
The mental energy is the force behind
Right Effort that propels both negative and positive action.
On positive aspect the mental energy
fuels self discipline, benevolence, loving kindness and compassion while on negative
aspect, the same mental energy fuels desire, jealousy, anger, aversion and
violence.
Right Effort implies to four types of
endeavours in ascending order of perfection:
i... discard evil thought that has already arisen
ii... prevent the arising of un-arise evil
thought
iii...develop un-arise good thought
iv...promote the good thought that has
already arisen.
Mind creates thought and emotion, which
determines attitude and determines action.
It is the mind that creates either happiness
or sorrow.
Both Samsara and Nirvana exist in our mind. Samsara is a state of mind turned outward and
lost in illusion and ignorance. Conversely,
Nirvana is the state of mind turned inward into itself recognising the true nature
of mind.
It is the endeavour for mental
development to create good thoughts, and mindfulness on thoughts and emotions makes
a man happy.
It is from good thoughts and emotions
comes patience and endurance that enables us to live in harmony and exercise
tolerance in unpleasant circumstances.
The skilful thought creates positive
attitude while unskilful thought creates negative attitude. The skilful thoughts are destined to bring
about happiness to oneself and others equally, while unskilful thoughts bring
about suffering for everyone.
II...Right
Mindfulness: Samma Smrti
Right Mindfulness means being mindful
at all time, with regard to body, feeling, thought, and mental objects.
Right Mindfulness is a state of being
aware of the realities within oneself, without any craving, clinging or
aversion.
Being mindful, means being aware of things
as what they are with clear conscience.
Four foundations of mindfulness are the
contemplation of the: (1) body, (2) feeling, including repulsive, attractive,
or neutral, (3) state of mind, and (4) phenomena.
Right Mindfulness means having controlled
and perfected faculty of cognition.
Right Mindfulness means to be aware and
ensure the motif and intent of thought and action are right.
Practicing Right Mindfulness, one
should:
i...
abandon wrong views, and enter and remain in right view
ii... abandon wrong resolve, and enter
and remain in right resolve
iii...abandon wrong speech, and enter
and remain in right speech
iv...abandon wrong action, and enter
and remain in right action
v... abandon wrong livelihood, and enter
and remain in right livelihood.
If one has personal sensual desire, one should
be aware of it that there is sensual desire.
One should be aware of how the arising sensual desire not yet arisen comes
about, how it is abandoned when it has arisen, and how in the future there is
no arising of sensual desire.
If one has personal malevolence, one should
be aware of it that there is malevolence.
One should be aware of the arising....and the abandoning thereof, and
how in future there is no recurrence of malevolence.
If
one has personal sloth and torpor; excitement and furry; and if in one has personal
doubt and wavering; one should be aware of them. One should be aware as how each of these
arises, is abandoned and reoccurs not again in future.
For Right Mindfulness one should know the relationship
between Nama and Rupa.
Nama is mind.
Mind is comprised of 1) consciousness, and 2) mental factors; both positive
and negative.
Rupa is form. Rupa
refers to sight, sounds, odours, touches and tastes, and the attachment to these
sense objects.
Mind is the knower but it is impersonal. It does not have independent existence and it
is mortal.
Rupa is object.
It is body but it is not knower.
Rupa is not conscious. Rupa must
be informed by Nama in order to be experienced.
When mind is aware of sight, seeing happens, and so on.
Both Nama and Rupa are impermanent and are in
continuous flux.
Nama and Rupa are the two faculties to which we should
remain mindful.
When one rightly understands the interplay of Nama and
Rupa, three things become evident: (i) Anicca -impermanence, (ii) Anatta -impersonality
of phenomenal existence, and (ii) Dukkha -un-satisfactoriness.
With the knowledge of Nama and Rupa, one becomes
convinced of impermanence, impersonality, and un-satisfactoriness.
When Nama and Rupa are transcended, the third element,
the inner consciousness is elevated.
At the highest state of consciousness, one attains the
highest state of awareness at which the Ahangkar -Ego, is fully destroyed and
one becomes enlightened.
At the highest level of awareness, when Nama and Rupa
are transcended, the Buddha Nature, inherently present within, is realised.
III...Right
Concentration: Samma Samadhi
The Right Effort and Right Mindfulness lead
to Right Concentration.
Right Concentration is a state of
profound stillness and bliss. It is the culminating
stage of meditative absorption.
Right concentration enables to develop mental force to
which all mental faculties are unified and directed onto one particular object
which is wholesome.
At Right Concentration one loses one’s
own identity and become one with the object of concentration with undisturbed
mind. The wondering mind completely
controlled.
Right Concentration attunes mind to
think positive that motivates to do wholesome deed. It trains mind to stay in one object and
remain un-distracted.
At Right Concentration, the I-consciousness,
the Ahangkara -Ego is completely dissolved and there is complete withdrawal
from attachment and aversion, and perfect harmony between oneself and others is
established.
One may realize Right
Concentration yet one may not be enlightened.
For being enlightened one needs to transcend Right Concentration into
divine world realizing Buddha Nature irreversibly.
