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Articles: My Thoughts | The Four Noble Truths
- Ms. Pradeepa kanuganti
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The accumulation of future suffering arises when, after falling into various evil ways due to sensuous craving, beings die and at the dissolution of the body, descend downward into the abyss of hell or into an intense state of suffering and perdition.
Closely associated with the Noble Truth of Suffering is the law of karma. According to this law, all beings are owners (cause) as well as heirs (effect) of their deeds. Whether good or bad, they are the originators of all their actions. When these deeds ripen they will earn the fruit of their actions either in this life or in the next life or in any other future life. Thus beings who give birth to their actions, also eventually are born out of their own actions later on. As long as the beings are subjected to sensuous craving, this cycle of birth and rebirth and suffering from birth to birth goes on till the end of the world.
This is called the Noble Truth of the Origin of Suffering.
(3)The Noble Truth of the Extinction of Suffering
Buddhism is not a religion of despair, but of hope and freedom. It is very optimistic about the possibility of ending suffering. The Buddha declared that despite of so much suffering all around, there was no need for despair and that the suffering could be ended eventually through an intelligent path of action. He found the solution in the problem itself.
Suffering ends when the craving ends. It ceases to exist, only when the beings achieve complete liberation from it. The seeds of this reverse process are sown when a monk or a follower of the Buddha becomes aware of the impermanent and distasteful nature of the world and its objects.
There are five stages in this process of this liberation. They are, the extinction of craving, the extinction of clinging, the extinction of the effects of karma, the extinction of rebirth and the extinction of rebirth, cessation of decay, death, sorrow, lamentation, suffering, grief and despair.
When a person passes through these five stages, his craving ceases and he finds permanent freedom from all forms of suffering. He becomes liberated from the world of impermanence and change. He does not return nor re-enter into the wheel of existence.
The path to Nirvana goes through two stages. The first phase happens when a person is still alive on earth. During this phase, all the impurities of the seeker are removed and he becomes an Arhat or a holy person. At this stage the ego is no more nourished, but remains on earth in a very diminished state. The second stage is set in motion when the fivefold process comes to an end and the Arhat leaves this world. At this stage the ego is completely dissolved, without any trace, bringing an end to the five fold process.
When the Arhat or the holy one passes away, he attain the realm where there is nothing, where there is 'neither solid nor fluid, neither heat nor motion, neither this world nor any other world, neither the sun nor the moon.' This is called the cessation of becoming which is 'neither arising, nor passing away, neither standing still nor being born, nor dying.' It is Nirvana, which is unborn, without source, uncreated and unformed real into which escape is possible for the beings through cessation of craving.
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