{"id":478,"date":"2020-09-25T12:00:48","date_gmt":"2020-09-25T06:00:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/thebuddhasaid\/?p=478"},"modified":"2020-09-25T09:35:12","modified_gmt":"2020-09-25T03:35:12","slug":"the-unawakened-life-sucks","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/thebuddhasaid\/2020\/09\/the-unawakened-life-sucks\/","title":{"rendered":"The Unawakened Life Sucks – The First Noble Truth"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<\/head>

<\/p>\n

The Buddha said:<\/p>\n

Now this is the noble truth (that the unawakened life) sucks. Rebirth sucks; old age sucks; sickness sucks; death sucks; association with the disliked sucks; separation from the liked sucks; not getting what you want sucks. In brief, (everything) sucks (because of) the grasping of the five (mind-body) processes (SN 56.11 Forrest).<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Your greatest joys will fad, your dearest loved ones will die, your favorite things will break, and everyone you know will go away in the end. That is bad enough, but you will have to repeat the whole thing over and over and over again. If fact, you already have. You have been born, gotten sick, grown old, and died millions upon millions of times. The only reason you don\u2019t believe this is that you have forgotten your previous lives.<\/p>\n

This thing Called Dukkha<\/h2>\n My translation of the Pali word dukkha<\/em> is unconventional I will admit. The standard translation is \u201cthe noble truth of suffering\u201d (SN 56.11 Bodhi). Bhikkhu Thanissaro translates it as \u201cthe noble truth of stress\u201d (SN 56.11 Thanissaro). I think Peter Harvey gets closer with \u201cthe true reality which is pain\u201d (SN 56.11 Harvey). But this still does not catch the full meaning of dukkha<\/em>.<\/p>\n If you look up dukkha<\/em> in the Pali-English Dictionary<\/em> it says, \u201cThere is no word in English covering the same ground as Dukkha<\/em> does in Pali. Our modern words are too specialised, too limited, and usually too strong.\u201d Everybody seems to agree with Bhikkhu Bodhi about dukkha<\/em>, \u201cThe Pali word is often translated as suffering, but it means something deeper than pain and misery. It refers to a basic unsatisfactoriness running through our lives, the lives of all but the enlightened\u201d (Noble Eightfold Path<\/em> 6). What is strange is that everyone agrees that unsatisfactoriness is better than suffering, yet no one translates it that way.<\/p>\n If I had to produce a translation for publication, I think I would translate this passage this way:<\/p>\n " Now this is the noble truth of (the) unsatisfactoriness (of conditioned existence). Rebirth is unsatisfactory; old age is unsatisfactory; illness is unsatisfactory; death is unsatisfactory; association with the disliked is unsatisfactory; separation from the liked is unsatisfactory; not getting what you want is unsatisfactory. In brief, (all the results of) the grasping of the five (mind-body) processes are unsatisfactory (SN 56.11 Forrest).<\/p><\/blockquote>\n But translating dukkha<\/em> as unsatisfactoriness is clumsy. It also lacks the emotional feel of the word dukkha<\/em>. As Leigh Brasington right points out, \u201cThe extremely important Pali word dukkha<\/em> gets translated using a number of different English words: suffering, stress, unsatisfactoriness. But none of these words really capture what the Buddha was saying when he used the word dukkha<\/em>. It does mean \u2018suffering\u2019 and \u2018stress\u2019 and \u2018unsatisfactoriness\u2019 \u2013 but it includes all the minor annoyances of life as well.\u201d<\/p>\n In the article, Leigh Brasington translates our passage as:<\/p>\n " What is the Noble Truth of dukkha<\/em>? Birth is a bummer; aging is a bummer; illness is a bummer; death is a bummer; grief, lamentation, bodily pain, mental pain and despair are bummers; having to associate with what is displeasing is a bummer, separation from what is pleasing is a bummer; not getting what one wants, that too is a bummer: In brief the five aggregates subject to grasping are all bummers.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Notice that he does not translate the first instance of dukkha<\/em>. This is because the case is different in the first instance it is\u00a0dukkha\u1e43<\/em>. The rest of the time the word is dukkho<\/em> or dukkh\u0101<\/em>. This means you need to distinguish \u201cunsatisfactoriness\u201d from that which is \u201cunsatisfactory.\u201d Of course, the translation of dukkha<\/em> as \u201csucks\u201d also suffers from the same problem. That is why the more accurate translation is the one using \u201cunsatisfactoriness\u201d and \u201cunsatisfactory.\u201d But the reason I bring all this up is that Leigh Brasington is right, \u201csuffering, stress, unsatisfactoriness\u201d doesn\u2019t do it full justice. But no English word does. I think \u201cunsatisfactoriness\u201d is the closest in meaning, and the slang word sucks catches the emotional feeling of dukkha<\/em>.<\/p>\n Rebirth<\/h2>\n I will not rehash my argument for rebirth, see my article entitled The Denial of Rebirth<\/a>. What I want to do this time arose is show that the idea is not exclusively Eastern.<\/p>\n Benjamin Franklin said, \u201cI look upon death to be as necessary to the constitution as sleep. We shall rise refreshed in the morning.\u201d And, \u201cFinding myself to exist in the world, I believe I shall, in some shape or other always exist.\u201d<\/p>\n Mark Twain said, \u201cI have been born more times than anybody except Krishna.\u201d<\/p>\n Henry Ford said, \u201cI adopted the theory of reincarnation when I was 26. Genius is experience. Some think to seem that it is a gift or talent, but it is the fruit of long experience in many lives.\u201d<\/p>\n Johann Wolfgang von Goethe said, \u201cAs long as you are not aware of the continual law of Die and Be Again, you are merely a vague guest on a dark Earth.\u201d<\/p>\n Freidrich Nietzsche said, \u201cLive so that thou mayest desire to live again \u2013 that is thy duty \u2013 for in any case thou wilt live again!\u201d<\/p>\n Mahatma Gandhi said, \u201cI cannot think of permanent enmity between man and man, and believing as I do in the theory of reincarnation, I live in the hope that if not in this birth, in some other birth I shall be able to hug all of humanity in friendly embrace.\u201d<\/p>\n Ralph Waldo Emerson said, \u201cThe soul comes from without into the human body, as into a temporary abode, and it goes out of it anew it passes into other habitations, for the soul is immortal.\u201d And, \u201cIt is the secret of the world that all things subsist and do not die, but only retire a little from sight and afterwards return again. Nothing is dead; men feign themselves dead, and endure mock funerals\u2026 and there they stand looking out of the window, sound and well, in some strange new disguise.\u201d<\/p>\n Albert Schweitzer said, \u201cReincarnation contains a most comforting explanation of reality by means of which Indian thought surmounts difficulties which baffle the thinkers of Europe.\u201d<\/p>\n Walt Whitman said, \u201cI know I am deathless. No doubt I have died myself ten thousand times before. I laugh at what you call dissolution, and I know the amplitude of time.\u201d<\/p>\n William Wordsworth said, \u201cOur birth is but a sleep and a forgetting; The Soul that rises with us, our life\u2019s Star, Hath had elsewhere its setting. And cometh from afar.\u201d<\/p>\n Jalalu Rumi said, \u201cI died as a mineral and became a plant, I died as a plant and rose to animal, I died as animal and I was man. Why should I fear? When was I less by dying?\u201d<\/p>\n Carl Jung said, \u201cMy life often seemed to me like a story that has no beginning and no end. I had the feeling that I was a historical fragment, an excerpt for which the preceding and succeeding text was missing. I could well imagine that I might have lived in former centuries and there encountered questions I was not yet able to answer; that I had been born again because I had not fulfilled the task given to me.\u201d<\/p>\n Socrates said, \u201cI am confident that there truly is such a thing as living again, that the living spring from the dead, and that the souls of the dead are in existence.\u201d<\/p>\n Jesus Christ said (in Gnostic Gospels: Pistis Sophia), \u201cSouls are poured from one into another of different kinds of bodies of the world.\u201d<\/p>\n Voltaire said, \u201cIt is not more surprising to be born twice than once; everything in nature is resurrection.\u201d<\/p>\n Josephus said, \u201cAll pure and holy spirits live on in heavenly places, and in course of time they are again sent down to inhabit righteous bodies.\u201d<\/p>\n Arthur Schopenhauer said, \u201cWere an Asiatic to ask me for a definition of Europe, I should be forced to answer him: It is that part of the world which is haunted by the incredible delusion that man was created out of nothing, and that his present birth is his first entrance into life.\u201d<\/p>\n George Harrison said, \u201cFriends are all souls that we\u2019ve known in other lives. We\u2019re drawn to each other. Even if I have only known them a day., it doesn\u2019t matter. I\u2019m not going to wait till I have known them for two years, because anyway, we must have met somewhere before, you know.\u201d<\/p>\n I think it would be good to pause and let me clarify something. In Buddhism<\/a>, rebirth and reincarnation are not the same things. I know it is in most people\u2019s minds, but it is a misunderstanding. Reincarnation is the teaching that the soul (Sanskrit, Atman<\/em>) at the death of the body, leaves the body and enters into another body. The Buddha was very clear that there is no such thing as a soul or Atman<\/em> (MN 22). This means that there is no soul to transmigrate from body to body. Rather, the Buddha taught that we are processes not essences. What happens in rebirth is more like a candle flame. When you use one candle to light another candle, is the new flame the same or different from the first candle? That\u2019s rebirth in Buddhism.<\/p>\n Rebirth Sucks<\/h2>\n***** ** *****The Buddha said:<\/p>\n " Bhikkhus, this samsara is without discoverable beginning. A first point is not discerned of beings roaming and wandering on hindered by ignorance and fettered by craving. Suppose, bhikkhus, a man would cut up whatever grass, sticks, branches, and foliage there are in this Jambud\u012bpa and collect them together into a single heap. Having done so, he would put them down, saying [for each one]: \u2018This is my mother, this my mother\u2019s mother.\u2019 The sequence of that man\u2019s mothers and grandmothers would not come to an end, yet the grass, wood, branches, and foliage in this Jambud\u012bpa would be used up and exhausted. For what reason? Because, bhikkhus, this samsara is without discoverable beginning. A first point is not discerned of beings roaming and wandering on hindered by ignorance and fettered by craving. For such a long time, bhikkhus, you have experienced suffering, anguish, and disaster, and swelled the cemetery. It is enough to experience revulsion towards all formations, enough to become dispassionate towards them, enough to be liberated from them (SN 15.1 Bodhi).<\/p><\/blockquote>\n \u201cThe Buddha,\u201d writes Bhikkhu Bodhi, \u201cteaches our individual lifespan to be merely a single phase within a series of rebirths that has been proceeding without any discernible beginning in time. This series of rebirths is called samsara<\/em>, a Pali word which suggests the idea of \u2018directionless wandering\u2019\u201d (In the Buddha\u2019s Words<\/em> 24). I have translated the Pali word samsara<\/em> as \u201cprison of rebirth<\/a>.\u201d Here is my translation of this passage, \u201cPractitioners, this prison of rebirth has no known beginning. No starting point is found for the journey of sentient beings through endless rebirths, hindered by ignorance and chained by craving\u201d (SN 15.1 Forrest).<\/p>\n Most Westerns think of reincarnation or rebirth as such a wonderful thing. But this is because people don\u2019t see the big picture. Even the Hindu religious leaders, who viewed reincarnation much more negatively, did not see the full picture. They thought that God was the highest, and that we are splinters of God trying to find our way back to union. But the Buddha was the full picture. \u201cThe true nature of Samsara was revealed to him,\u201d writes Eric Cheetham; \u201cthe gods did not create it and they did not, could not, control it. Nor was there an unchanging, indestructible essence that transmigrated\u201d (8).<\/p>\n Old Age, Sickness, and Death Sucks<\/h2>\n******* ** *******The Buddha said:<\/p>\n " Now this is the noble truth (that the unawakened life) sucks. Rebirth sucks; old age sucks; sickness sucks; death sucks; association with the disliked sucks; separation from the liked sucks; not getting what you want sucks. In brief, (everything) sucks (because of) the grasping of the five (mind-body) processes (SN 56.11 Forrest).<\/p><\/blockquote>\n******* ** Let me wrap up this cheery article by saying that the unawakened life sucks. But this doesn\u2019t mean there are not happy times. There are, but they never last. Even going to heaven doesn\u2019t last. Everything is impermanent means that everything in conditioned existence is unreliable, changeable, and has no lasting substance. It means that, until we attain Nirvana, we have to see old age, sickness, and death over and over again.<\/p>\n ** *******The Buddha said:<\/p>\n " There is an unborn, unoriginated, uncreated, unconditioned. If there were not that unborn, unoriginated, uncreated, unconditioned, you could not discern an escape from the born, originated, created, and conditioned. But because there is an unborn, unoriginated, uncreated, unconditioned, therefore you can discern an escape from the born, originated, created, and conditioned (Ud 8.3 Forrest).<\/p><\/blockquote>\n******* ** Of course, as unenlightened individuals we cannot \u201cdiscern an escape.\u201d You have to reach the higher levels of meditation to do that. And so we are stuck either accepting or rejecting the testimony of the Buddha. This is a hard sell to modern men and women who refuse to take anything on faith. But if the Buddha was right about 95 things that we can confirm, can we trust him on the five things we can\u2019t yet confirm?<\/p>\n ** Rebirth is real and it is not a good thing. Rebirth, old age, sickness, and death sucks (SN 56.11 Forrest). The situation within condition existence is not pretty. \u201cBut in its main outline, in its general structure and content, Sakyamuni\u2019s revelation was a valid picture with one overriding addition,\u201d writes Eric Cheetham, \u201cit was far worse than any of the previous speculation and partial views had imagined\u201d (8). It was far worse than you think. Let that sink in. What if the Buddha is right?<\/p>\n ** Let me end with two quotes.<\/p>\n ** The Oracle from the Matrix<\/em> movie, after telling Neo the bad news about the future, says, \u201cOh, don\u2019t worry about it\u2026 As soon as you step outside that door, you\u2019ll start feeling better. You\u2019ll remember you don\u2019t believe in any of this fate crap\u2026 you\u2019re in control of your own life\u2026 remember?\u201d She holds out a tray of oatmeal cookies to Neo. \u201cHere, take a cookie\u2026 I promise, by the time you\u2019re done eating it, you\u2019ll feel right as rain.\u201d<\/p>\n ** You have a choice.<\/p>\n ** *******Morpheus said to Neo: \u201cThis is your last chance. After this, there is no turning back\u2026.. You take the blue pill, the story ends. You wake up and believe\u2026 whatever you want to believe. You take the red pill\u2026.. you stay in wonderland\u2026 and I show you just how deep the rabbit hole goes.\u201d<\/p>\n Works Cited<\/h3>\n References for Translations can be found on the Translations Used<\/a> page.<\/p>\n \nBodhi, Bhikkhu. In the Buddha\u2019s Words: An Anthology of Discourses from the Pali Canon<\/em>. Boston: Wisdom Publications, 2005. Print.<\/li>\nBodhi, Bhikkhu. The Noble Eightfold Path: Way to the End of Suffering<\/em>. Boston: Wisdom Publications, 2005. Print.<\/li>\nBrasington, Leigh. \u201cDukkha is A Bummer.\u201d Leigh Brasington\u2019s Web Site<\/em>. 2010. Web.<\/li>\nCheetham, Eric. Fundamentals of Mainstream Buddhism<\/em>. Boston: Charles E. Tuttle Co, 1994. Print.<\/li>\nPali Text Society\u2019s Pali\u2013English Dictionary, The<\/em>. \u201cDukkha.\u201d T. W. Rhys Davids, William Stede, eds. Chipstead: Pali Text Society, 1921\u20135. Web.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n********* ** Copyright \u00a9 2020 Jay N. Forrest. All Rights Reversed.<\/p>\n ** Image by Kellepics via Pixabay<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" ** *********The Buddha said: Now this is the noble truth (that the unawakened life) sucks. Rebirth sucks; old age sucks; sickness sucks; death sucks; association with the disliked sucks; separation from the liked sucks; not getting what you want sucks. In brief, (everything) sucks (because of) the grasping of the five (mind-body) processes (SN 56.11 Forrest). […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4405,"featured_media":488,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[176,185,179,173,182],"class_list":["post-478","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-buddhism","tag-dukkha","tag-first-noble-truth","tag-pain","tag-suffering","tag-unsatisfactoriness"],"yoast_head":"\nThe Unawakened Life Sucks - The First Noble Truth<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"The Buddha said: Now this is the noble truth (that the unawakened life) sucks. 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