..續本文上一頁which in one word are indicated the root and cause of all suffering, namely clinging (upaadaana).
This is the Second Noble Truth:
The source of all suffering is attachment, craving, clinging.
This craving takes one of three forms: craving for sense-pleasures, craving for permanent existence or eternalism, craving for no more existence or annihilationism.
The truth of this statement will at once become clear when it is considered (and this is the Third Noble Truth) that with the utter cessation of craving also suffering will come to an end. For, he who has no desires is always content. Contentment cannot be obtained in any other way, for desires are ”unsatisfiable”, likened unto a bare bone with which a dog cannot still its hunger, decaying flesh which is poisonous, a torch of straw borne against the wind which thus burns the hand of the bearer, borrowed goods which cannot be kept in possession.
Is it pessimism to consider pleasures as suffering
No, it is actuality! But to consider the satisfaction of the senses as real pleasure—that is sheer folly. In order to cure that folly, the fact of suffering is raised to the rank of a noble truth; for folly can only be cured by wisdom.
This shows again how Buddhist ethics or moral principles, like everything else in Buddhism, are based on a foundation quite different from morality in other religions.
Mental development is exactly what is needed for the development of morality. For, “when religion ceases to be wisdom, it becomes superstition overlaid with reasoning” (George Santayana).
In other religions good conduct is enough to become a saint: “If you have love, you have perfected the law,” said St. Paul to the Ephesians.
According to later reformers like Luther, faith alone is enough for salvation.
But in Buddhism real virtue is impossible, without the foundation of reason. The truth must both be experienced and understood.
To experience suffering surely can be done by any being endowed with feeling; that, however, does not prevent a possible return. Understanding therefore is necessary of the real nature of the evil and of its cause. When properly understood suffering will be seen as an effect of action which must have been evil to produce such a bad effect. When thus understood in connection with action, it becomes living like actuality itself. No longer passive fate but active “kamma,” which means self-responsibility.
Action is not finished with action and it is just that which makes life so terribly actual.
At every moment I am reaping the fruit of the past; at every moment I am sowing the seed for the future.
Is there then no escape possible, no salvation
There is! And the escape lies along the Noble Eightfold Path of which Right Understanding is the first step. Like knowledge of a disease is the chance for a cure, thus understanding the cause-and-action of suffering is the beginning of Deliverance.
This understanding should be accompanied by the right intention. It should express itself in word and deed, in practical daily life, in perseverance and in mind control.
Thus should suffering be comprehended, the cause of suffering eradicated, the cessation of suffering realized and the path leading to the cessation of suffering developed. For, the knowledge of the truths must be translated into function, if ever the task will be accomplished.
This is the Noble Path that avoids the two extremes of materialism under all its disguises and of idealism with all its false decorations.
It is the Path of Actuality that leads to Reality. Only having realized this Path with knowledge and insight, the deliverance of mind is steadfast, the last life is reached, rebirth no more waits.
And how did the five monks to whom this first sermon was preac…
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