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The
Dharma
In
his first sermon, the "Deer Park Sermon" in Banares, the Buddha summed
up the Truth of existence in what is known as the "Four Noble Truths":
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The
cause of suffering is self-centered desire and attachments (ego), personal
preferences and rejections, cravings and repulsion, likes and dislikes
What
makes this life problematic is that our wants (desires) are out of alignment
with our life experience.
We
cannot change the world but we can change ourselves. "You can't always
get what you want, but if you try sometime, you just might find, you get what
you need" (can want what you get).
A
video review of the Four Noble Truths
A simple,
colorful interactive presentation of the Four Noble
Truths and the Eightfold
Path
The
"Eight-Fold Path" consists of three parts:
-
Right
understanding, views, knowledge (of the Four Noble Truths)
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Right
motivation, intention, aspiration, thought (dispassionate benevolence)
(think good thoughts)
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Right
speech (no lying, no gossip, no slander, no idle talk) (speak good
words)
-
Right
action, behavior (no stealing, no killing, no illicit sex, no intoxicants)
(do good deeds)
-
Right
livelihood (earn a living so as not to commit wrong speech or action)
(live a good life)
-
Right
effort (avoid arousing evil thoughts, cut off unwholesome states of past,
present and future [change old, bad habits])
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Right
mindfulness, awareness (full awareness in every moment)
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Right
meditation, concentration, absorption (quieting the mind, do not be
distracted in one’s meditation practice, be centered and still.
Undistracted concentration on a particular object or image, e.g. a statue
of the Buddha or a Tanka or mandala)
By
"right" Buddha meant "complete", "proper", or
"perfected". The path is about aspiring to such perfection.
A
student notes:
The
way I remember them is "um-sal-emm". In the wisdom section
we have the Right Understanding and the Right Motivation.
In the morality section we have the Right Speech, the Right Action
and the Right Livelihood. And finally in the concentration
section we have the Right Effort, Right Mindfulness and the
Right Meditation.
For
further clarification on the Four Noble Truths and the Eight-fold Path, refer
to: BuddhaNet's
Basic Buddhism Guide
The
Five Precepts: (see right speech and right action, above)
The
basic ethical guidelines for a Buddhist life:
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Do
not kill or harm other living beings
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Do
not steal or take what has not been given to you
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Do
not over indulge in sensual pleasures (especially sex: do not participate in illicit or improper sexual relations
[i.e.,
outside of marriage])
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Do
not lie
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Do
not ingest intoxicants (alcohol) or illicit drugs (which confuse the
mind)
Activities:
Right
Action - a collage
Right Livelihood - a collage
The
Five Precepts - a collage
Success
in this path results in Nirvana: literally to be "blown out" like
a candle is extinguished. Nirvana is the extinction/cessation of the experience of desire
and suffering and, ultimately, the experience of life itself (life, existence is
understood to be little more than
a series of experiences). This is the way out of Samsara, the Buddhist
conception of Moksha, the cessation of life through escape from the cycle of
reincarnation. (As an Indian religion, Buddhism believes in reincarnation,
Karma, Samsara and Moksha)
One
who achieves Nirvana, the blissful state of enlightenment, will upon death, like
the Buddha, enter Parinirvana wherein the individual self is entirely
extinguished, never to incarnate again, not even to exist in some heavenly
realm. The cessation of experience = cessation of existence in Samsara - the
realm of experience (Buddhism teaches that life/existence consists of no more
than a series of experiences).
Although,
most Buddhist temples will have a statue of the Buddha, they only revere and
honor him as a hero figure - he is not worshipped by Buddhists and is not
considered a god. Having entered Parinirvana upon his death, Siddhartha
Gautama, the historical Buddha, no longer exists in any way, shape or
form.
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