Buddhism’s Four Noble Truths

The Four Aryan (or Noble) Truths are perhaps the most basic
formulation of the Buddha’s teaching. They are expressed as follows:

1. All existence is dukkha. The word dukkha has been variously

translated as ‘suffering’, ‘anguish’, ‘pain’, or ‘unsatisfactoriness’. The
Buddha’s insight was that our lives are a struggle, and we do not find
ultimate happiness or satisfaction in anything we experience. This is
the problem of existence.

2. The cause of dukkha is craving. The natural human tendency is to

blame our difficulties on things outside ourselves. But the Buddha says
that their actual root is to be found in the mind itself. In particular our
tendency to grasp at things (or alternatively to push them away)
places us fundamentally at odds with the way life really is.

3. The cessation of dukkha comes with the cessation of craving. As we

are the ultimate cause of our difficulties, we are also the solution. We
cannot change the things that happen to us, but we can change our
responses.

4. There is a path that leads from dukkha. Although the Buddha throws
responsibility back on to the individual he also taught methods through
which we can change ourselves, for example the Noble Eightfold Path.

Buddhism’s Noble Eightfold Path

The eightfold path, although referred to as steps on a path, is not
meant as a sequential learning process, but as eight aspects of life, all
of which are to be integrated in every day life. Thus the environment is
created to move closer to the Buddhist path.

Right Understanding
The first step of the eightfold path is Right Understanding or Right
View.This is a significant step on the path as it relates to seeing the
world and everything in it as it really is, not as we believe it to be or
want it to be. Just as you may read the directions on a map, and then
make the journey, studying, reading and examining the information is
important, but only the preparation for the journey. At a deeper level,
direct personal experience will then lead us to Right Understanding.

Right Intent
The second step on the Eightfold Path is Right Intent. This is the step
where we become committed to the path. Right Understanding shows
us what life really is and what life’s problems are composed of, Right
Intent urges us to decide what our heart wants.

Right Speech
Right Speech is the next step of the Path. We tend to underestimate
the power of the spoken word, and often regret words said in haste.
Each of us has experienced the disappointment associated with harsh
criticism, whether justified or not, and we also are likely to have felt
good when kind words encouraged us.

Right Action
Right Action recognises the need to take the ethical approach in life,
to consider others and the world we live in. This includes not taking
what is not given to us, and having respect for the agreements we
make both in our private and business lives.

Right Livelihood
The next on the Eightfold Path follows on from Right Action, and this is
Right Livelihood. If your work has a lack of respect for life, then it will
be a barrier to progress on the spiritual path. Buddhism promotes the
principle of equality of all living beings and respect for all life.

Right Effort
Right Effort means cultivating an enthusiasm, a positive attitude in a
balanced way. Like the strings of a musical instrument, the amount of
effort should not be too tense or too impatient, as well as not too slack
or too laid back. Right Effort should produce an attitude of steady and
cheerful determination.

Right Mindfulness
Right Mindfulness means being aware of the moment, and being
focused in that moment. When we travel somewhere, we are hearing
noises, seeing buildings, trees, advertising, feeling the movement,
thinking of those we left behind, thinking of our destination. So it is
with most moments of our lives.

Right Concentration
Once the mind is uncluttered, it may then be concentrated to achieve
whatever is desired. Right Concentration is turning the mind to focus
on an object, such as a flower, or a lit candle, or a concept such as
loving compassion. This forms the next part of the meditation process.
Right concentration implies that we select worthy directions for the
concentration of the mind, although everything in nature, beautiful and
ugly, may be useful for concentration. At deeper levels, no object or
concept may be necessary for further development.

Buddhism’s Five Precepts

ABSTAIN FROM TAKING LIFE
In the five precepts, “taking life” means to murder anything that lives.
It refers to the striking and killing of living beings. Taking life is the
will to kill anything that one perceives as having life, to act so as to
terminate the life-force in it, in so far as the will finds expression in
bodily action or in speech. With regard to animals it is worse to kill
large ones than small. Because a more extensive effort is involved.
Even where the effort is the same, the difference in substance must be
considered.

In the case of humans the killing is the more blameworthy the more
virtuous they are. Apart from that, the extent of the offense is
proportionate to the intensity of the wish to kill. Five factors are
involved: a living being, the perception of a living being, a thought of
murder, the action of carrying it out, and death as a result of it. And six
are the ways in which the offense may be carried out: with one’s own
hand, by instigation, by missiles, by slow poisoning, by sorcery, by
psychic power.

ABSTAIN FROM TAKING WHAT IS NOT GIVEN

“To take what is not given” means the appropriation of what is not
given. It refers to the removing of someone else’s property, to the
stealing of it, to theft. “What is not given” means that which belongs to
someone else. “Taking what is not given” is then the will to steal
anything that one perceives as belonging to someone else, and to act
so as to appropriate it. Its blameworthiness depends partly on the
value of the property stolen, partly on the worth of its owner. Five
factors are involved: someone else’s belongings, the awareness that
they are someone else’s, the thought of theft, the action of carrying it
out, the taking away as a result of it. This sin, too, may be carried out
in six ways. One may also distinguish unlawful acquisition by way of
theft, robbery, underhand dealings, stratagems, and the casting of lots.

ABSTAIN FROM SENSUOUS MISCONDUCT

“Sensuous misconduct” – here “sensuous” means “sexual,” and
“misconduct” is extremely blameworthy bad behavior. “Sensuous
misconduct” is the will to transgress against those whom one should
not go into, and the carrying out of this intention by unlawful physical
action. By “those one should not go into,” first of all men are meant.
And then also twenty kinds of women. Ten of them are under some
form of protection, by their mother, father, parents, brother, sister,
family, clan, co-religionists, by having been claimed from birth
onwards, or by the king’s law.

The other ten kinds are: women bought with money, concubines for
the fun of it, kept women, women bought by the gift of a garment,
concubines who have been acquired by the ceremony which consists
in dipping their hands into water, concubines who once carried
burdens on their heads, slave girls who are also concubines, servants
who are also concubines, girls captured in war, temporary wives. The
offense is the more serious, the more moral and virtuous the person
transgressed against. It involves four factors: someone who should not
be gone into, the thought of cohabiting with that one, the actions
which lead to such cohabitation, and its actual performance. There is
only one way of carrying it out: with one’s own body.

ABSTAIN FROM FALSE SPEECH

“False speech” is the will to deceive others by words or deeds. One
can also explain: “False” means something which is not real, not true.
“Speech” is the intimation that that is real or true. “False speech” is
then the volition which leads to the deliberate intimation to someone
else that something is so when it is not so.

The seriousness of the offense depends on the circumstances. If a

householder, unwilling to give something, says that he has not got it,
that is a small offense; but to represent something one has seen with
one’s own eyes as other than one has seen it, that is a serious offense.
If a mendicant has on his rounds got very little oil or butter, and if he
then exclaims, “What a magnificent river flows along here, my friends!”
that is only a rather stale joke, and the offense is small.
But to say that one has seen what one has not seen, that is a serious
offense. Four factors are involved: something which is not so, the
thought of deception, an effort to carry it out, the communication of
the falsehood to someone else. There is only one way of doing it: with
one’s own body.

ABSTAIN FROM INTOXICANTS AS TENDING TO CLOUD THE MIND

The last of the five precepts is to refrain from taking intoxicants that
cloud the mind and cause heedlessness. This means drugs and alcohol
(but not prescription medication). This precept is a traditional way of
detoxifying our bodies and minds. And it can be challenging at events
where alcohol is considered a means of socialization and relaxation.
However, with commitment, these situations often prove to be less
awkward than we had feared. The benefits of keeping the vow turn out
to be even more fruitful than we had hoped.