Transcript The Human Condition / The Goals

The Human Condition
The Four Noble Truths – Part One
The Four Noble Truths
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1.
2.
3.
4.
These are the basis of all Buddhist teaching
These were alluded to in the Buddha’s first sermon
(The Sermon at Benares)
Buddhists use a doctor analogy to explain them:
The Buddha is the doctor who makes the diagnosis
that something is ‘wrong’ – Dukkha
The diagnosis of the cause of the illness is craving
(tanha) – Samudaya
There is a cure; it is to achieve nibbana – Nirodha
The prescription is to follow the Noble Eightfold Path
- Magga
The First Noble Truth - Dukkha
• Also one of the Three Universal Truths /
Marks of Existence
• Means ‘unsatisfactoriness’
• Idea that suffering is everywhere all the time –
even if we think we are happy!
• Caused by failure to understand anicca
Second Noble Truth - Samudaya
• The cause of dukkha (the actual illness) is tanha
(craving)
• Because you do not understand anicca, you crave
permanence and possessions
• You want relationships to always be good, you want
to never be ill, you always want money and
possessions thinking they’ll make you happy forever,
etc.
• This is also a link with the Three Mental Poisons (or
Three Fires): Greed, Hatred and Ignorance
• All this craving makes you suffer: tanha causes
dukkha
• This is the Second Noble Truth of Samudaya
• See Dhammapada 334-342 (Cravings)