Search results for: "The Four Noble Truths"

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  2. The Beginnings of Wisdom
     … So the three perceptions find their role within the context of the four noble truths. In the same way, the perception of inconstancy finds its role within the context of our desire for long-term happiness. That desire is something the Buddha takes for granted. He says we all start with suffering. When we suffer, we search for somebody who knows s way out … 
  3. Not-self in Context
     … He always says he awoke to the four noble truths. So the answer has to be that he taught not-self because of the four noble truths, and the question to figure out is where not-self fits into those truths. It fits under the fact that he saw in the first noble truth that suffering is clinging, and there are four kinds of … 
  4. The Buddha’s Shoulds
     … You see them at the very beginning in the four noble truths. Each truth has a duty: Suffering is to be comprehended; its cause is to be abandoned; its cessation is to be realized; and the path to its cessation should be developed. If you appreciate the state of peace—in other words, if you believe that the cessation of suffering is something that … 
  5. The Wheel of Dhamma
    The Buddha started his teaching career with the four noble truths, as we chanted just now in the Discourse of Setting the Wheel of Dhamma in Motion. These truths are not just statements about reality. They’re a guide, a guide in how to look at things. You can look at reality in all kinds of ways. You can look at your experience in … 
  6. Acceptance
     … That led to his third knowledge, the four noble truths. The important part of the four noble truths is that they have duties. Suffering is to be comprehended. Craving, its cause, is to be abandoned. Cessation, dispassion for craving, is to be realized. You do that by developing the path. So there are things you have to do in order to gain awakening. You … 
  7. Ready for the Truth
    The Canon tells us that the Buddha’s most important teaching was the four noble truths, and that it covers everything else he taught. So this is the most important thing for us to learn to understand. But it’s also interesting to note that when the Buddha taught the four noble truths, especially to lay people, he prepared them first, with what’s … 
  8. Develop Your Inner Observer
     … So why am I doing this to myself?” This is where we get to the question we had this morning about seeing things in terms of the four noble truths. The four noble truths provide a framework for how to look at things so that we can stop suffering. Now, we may have other purposes: We may be looking at things in terms of … 
  9. Not-self
    If you want to understand the Buddha’s teachings on not-self, you have to see how those teachings fit into the context of the four noble truths. Remember that the four noble truths have their duties. Suffering, or stress, is to be comprehended. Craving, the cause of suffering and stress, is to be abandoned. The cessation of stress and suffering is to be … 
  10. Believing & Knowing
     … There seem to be two stages in that last knowledge, first in terms of the four noble truths that led to what’s called the arising of the Dhamma eye, and then—once the duties that are appropriate to the four noble truths have been completed—the four noble truths about the effluent of sensuality, the effluent of views, the effluent of ignorance. You … 
  11. Right Questions in the Right Order
     … the one on the four noble truths and the one on the three characteristics or the three perceptions. It’s important to note that the one on the four noble truths comes first. He starts out by saying that the path he teaches is for the sake of the deathless and for the sake of unbinding. So he establishes the purpose first. And what … 
  12. Let Go Like a Millionaire
     … Up until that point, though, the perceptions are there as tools for helping with the duties of the four noble truths. So always keep that in mind: that the four noble truths provide the context, and the three perceptions function within that context. This becomes important when you find yourself holding on to things that you think are constant. You have to tell yourself … 
  13. The Meaning of Insight
     … They’re there implicitly in terms of the duties of the four noble truths, under the insight into the drawbacks of the things to which you cling, the insight that’s for the sake of developing dispassion. But the Buddha never explicitly mentions them. He’s explicit about the four noble truths, though. He says that when you see those truths and see them … 
  14. Patience & Sensitivity
     … That’s how you can be said to know the four noble truths—you’ve actually done the duties; you’ve seen the results. To get that kind of insight, the Buddha recommends his five-step program. And it’s important to notice that this program is derived from the four noble truths. Seeing the origination—that’s the first step. Seeing the origination … 
  15. The Psychology of Harmlessness
     … This is why the techniques of meditation cannot really be separated from the values when doing them, because of the duties that the Buddha recommends for the four noble truths: Those duties embody values. In the beginning we do that out of conviction. I was struck a while back when hearing someone say that the four noble truths are not beliefs. Well, they’re … 
  16. Duties
     … After all, that’s the message of the four noble truths: There may be pains caused by the world outside—hurtful words, hurtful situations—but the real suffering that stabs at the mind is the suffering we add to things outside. The Buddha’s image is of two arrows. You get shot by one arrow, and that’s not enough, you shoot yourself with … 
  17. The Desire for Things to Be Different
     … Back in medieval India, when they introduced the four noble truths in the basic textbooks for Buddhist doctrine, they would start with the five aggregates; move quickly to the three characteristics, and then get to the four noble truths. In other words, they started with a picture of reality: Reality is composed of aggregates, and the aggregates are marked by the three characteristics. The … 
  18. Skillful Thinking
     … The basic evaluation here is based on the four noble truths. This is the Buddha’s guideline for discernment. Actually his guidelines go back even more simply than that, pointing out that there are actions that you may like to do that give good results, actions that you may like to do that give bad results, actions you don’t like to do that … 
  19. Two Hands Washing
     … The reason for this is that you’re trying to learn how to think in terms of the four noble truths. When the Buddha talked about appropriate attention, he defined it in terms of the four noble truths. Learning to see where the stress is, where’s the cause, where’s the cessation of stress, and what you’re doing to help the stress … 
  20. Universal Truths
     … And the other is the four noble truths: stress, its origination, its cessation, and the path of practice leading to its cessation. That’s it. Those are the teachings he taught as really basic. Those are the teachings that form the framework of the questions that he encourages people to ask. In terms of skillful and unskillful action, he said, this is what you … 
  21. Goodwill Permeates the Dhamma
     … The basic framework of the book was the four noble truths. But when he got to the sublime attitudes, he didn’t know where to put them in the four noble truths, so he stuck them in as an appendix, which is a real misunderstanding. To begin with, the four noble truths were taught because of the Buddha’s goodwill, because of his cultivation … 
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