Noble Truths In Buddhism

5 Pages 1232 Words

The Buddha Shakyamuni was born in the 6th century BC in the area which is known today as Nepal. During his 80 year lifetime, he developed a philosophy which he claimed would lead its followers towards an enlightenment. Buddhism is commonly called a religion however; it differs from the usual definition of a religion in that it has no divine being and is based on logical reasoning and observation rather than spiritual faith. At the core of Buddhist philosophy is the Buddha's enumeration of Four Noble Truths: Dukkha (suffering), Samudaya (origin of suffering), Nirodha (cessation of suffering), and Magga(path to cessation of suffering). These Four Noble Truths form a logically consistent set of rules, or somewhat of a law, upon which the whole Buddhist religion is based.

In order to fully understand the Four Noble Truths, it is necessary to investigate the Buddhist view of the individual and its makeup. In some respects, the manner in which Buddhism deals with the mind/body problem is much more advanced than most religious views, and closer to science's understanding of the mind and body. Rather than postulating the existence of an eternal soul with no physical manifestation, the Buddha taught that the person is really a collection of five skandhas or aggregates. These include rupa (matter), vedana (sensations), sanna (perceptions), samkhara (mental formations), and vijnana (consciousness). The aggregate of matter encompasses all tangible aspects of the world. The aggregate of sensations is akin to the process of sensory input; e.g., the activation of retinal cells in the eye. Vedana does not include the process of perception, however; the act of perceiving the senses, i.e., recognition of external sensations, is within the realm of the sanna. Buddha classified mental activities (samkhara), i.e., ideas and thoughts, as being disparate from the state of mental consciousness (vijnana). Consciousness, in the Buddhist view, is th...