four noble truths

Gautam Buddha’s most well-known teaching is that of the four noble truths.

The first of these truths is that there is suffering. We human beings suffer and if it were not for this suffering, then there would be no problem. We would live our lives contentedly, without needing to change anything, without needing any transformation. So suffering is the problem.

Having stated this basic problem as the first truth, Gautam Buddha moved onto the second noble truth: that there is a cause of this suffering, and the cause is craving, desire. This is a little less obvious than the first truth and it needs some investigation on one’s own to confirm. Here we are talking about psychological suffering, not physical pain. And this psychological suffering arises when we want something to be different to the way it is. And that is basically a desire: something we have in our mind as a possibility which we want, which is not currently the reality. This distance between reality and what we want is our suffering.

So having identified the basic problem for us humans, and the cause of it, the Buddha went on even more boldly to assert that this suffering can cease. We can go beyond it. We can reach a state where suffering no longer arises for us. This to begin with we have to take on trust. It is not our lived experience. And of course if Gautam Buddha were in front of us today we would probably have a feeling that this man has somehow transcended suffering, and that in itself would give us some confirmation of this third noble truth, that suffering can cease. And today, if we come before one of the lucky ones, an enlightened one, we may also have something of this feeling: that they are no longer suffering in the way we do.

So suffering can cease, was Buddha’s third assertion. And even more boldly still, his fourth noble truth says there is a path, there is a way to bring about the cessation of suffering. And the path that Gautam Buddha identified is called the eight-fold path. It consists of eight areas of our life, our behaviour, which we need to attend to diligently, carefully, to understand and to bring under control. And if we can do that, then our suffering will cease.

So these are the four noble truths that the buddha spoke of: that there is suffering; that there is a cause of suffering, namely craving, desire; that suffering can cease; and that there is a way that we can bring about that cessation of the suffering, namely the eight-fold path.

I have not followed the eight-fold path. It is not the only way to bring about the cessation of suffering, but I trust that it can work for those who diligently follow it. But Gautam Buddha’s great contribution with the four noble truths was really to highlight that our psychological suffering is the problem that needs to be attended to in life, and to give us some hints as to how to overcome that suffering. For suffering is indeed our problem with life, and if we can change things so that we no longer suffer, then our life will indeed become richer, more enjoyable, more beautiful.