Dukkha
Dukkha ( pali दुक्ख; Sanskrit दुःख duḥkha 'hard to bear') is a key term in Buddhism that is mostly translated as “ suffering ”. It is to be distinguished from dukkhatā , suffering . Dukkha is next to anatta (Sanskrit अनात्मन् anātman) "impersonality" and anicca (Sanskrit अिनत्य, anitya) "impermanence" one of the three characteristics of existence and at the same time the first of the four noble truths . They were first handed down orally by Siddhartha Gautama and first written down in the Dhammacakkappavattana Sutta ( saṃyutta nikaya 56.11), it is considered the first discourse after awakening , Bodhi of the Buddha .
meaning
The word field includes suffering, grief, misery and is in contrast to the term sukha (Sanskrit सुख sukha) which means well-being, comfort and happiness. In the old in the Pali Canon traditional Buddhist discourses is dukkha as one of the three marks of existence ( ti-Lakkhana ) and as the first of the " Four Noble Truths " ( ariyasacca called). This makes dukkha , at least in Theravada Buddhism, the central term for understanding Buddha Siddhartha Gautama's teaching.
Dukkha is a universal characteristic of all phenomena in the cycle of existence ( samsara ). That is, that does not apply to nirvana as it is overcoming dukkha. Overcoming the causes (desire) is related to the insight that things are impermanent ( anicca ) and insubstantial ( anatta ) and therefore cannot make us happy in the long run, i.e. sooner or later they are painful (dukkha). In relation to the four noble truths, three aspects of dukkha are considered:
- dukkha in the ordinary sense of suffering ( dukkha-dukkha ); such as suffering physical sensations, giving birth and being born, growing up and raising children, illness, aging, dying and caring for the sick, the aging and the dying. This first kind of suffering can be alleviated when a person becomes ready to accept body and mind and to recognize that physical and psychological irritations are part of human life.
- Dukkha caused by changes ( viparinama-dukkha ): for example, being human in the world is changeable, so suffering is inevitable, as long as man does not fully accept the fact that something conditioned changes as soon as even one of the conditions causing it changes. An alleviation can occur when the person matures with regard to his needs and desires and learns to calmly fit into the changeability and thus also the transience of everything that is conditioned.
- dukkha related to volitional activities ( samkhara-dukkha ); it is the suffering that grows from the erroneous conviction that man has or is a fixed "self", a "core I", a constant "subject" that experiences the joys and pains in life. This 'I' or 'self' turns out to be a 'narrative fiction', an illusion , an idea or story that people tell about themselves and thereby believed in a 'substantial being'. As long as you hold on to this idea, the process of suffering will continue. Enlightenment becomes about letting go and overcoming that basic self-delusion, the realization that there is nothing to lose and nothing to gain, because there is no substantial being that can lose or gain anything.
Dukkha as a feeling
The Pali word dukkha stands in common parlance for suffering, sorrow, misery in contrast to sukha , which means well-being, comfort, happiness. In a figurative sense, dukkha means suffering, being subject to suffering, inadequacy, misery, evil, pain, hurt, dissatisfaction: in other words, the tension-filled quality of all experiences that are accompanied by desire, attachment and self-addiction.
The four noble truths about suffering
The first of the four noble truths describes dukkha and typical experiences of sentient beings who are felt to be suffering due to the physical and mental processes ( skandha ) to which one is attached and with which one identifies.
“And what is the Noble Truth of Dukkha? Birth is dukkha; Aging is dukkha; Death is dukkha; Grief, lamentation, pain, grief, and despair are dukkha; not getting what one wants is dukkha; in short, the five groups of existence to which one is attached are dukkha. "
In Buddhist philosophy there are a total of six senses, the classic five and the sixth thought. All six senses are to be understood as mental processes. The five groups of existence (physicality, feeling, perception, volitional activity and consciousness) can accordingly be divided into the spiritual ( nama ) and the five physical senses ( rupa ). These five groups ( Skandhas ; Sanskrit: skandhāḥ ; Pāli: khandha ) suffer from attachment and acquisition of these mental processes; they are called the groups of attachment ( pañca upādānaskandhāḥ ). From this colored perspective, things then also appear in a distorted perspective.
In the second noble truth, the cause of what is suffering and inadequacy is named: desire ( tanha ). In the third truth, Buddha proclaims that he has found an end and extinction of this suffering (nirodha). And in the fourth truth he sets out the path that leads to the end of suffering, which is described as the Noble Eightfold Path (magga) and is a central element of Buddhist teaching.
In English
In English , dukkha is mostly translated as suffering or stress .
literature
- Nyanatiloka : The way to salvation in the words of the Buddhist originals. 1954. ( online )
- Nyanatiloka: Buddhist dictionary - dukkha , dukkhatā
- Dukkha , excerpts from suttas on the subject.
Web links
- The First Noble Truth
- The First Noble Truth. The noble truth of dukkha, dukkha ariya sacca. Lay translation 2005–2015 ( [2] on zugangzureinsicht.org)
Individual evidence
- ↑ Hellmuth Hecker (translator): Speaking of the accomplished. [1]
- ↑ See Dhammacakkappavattana Sutta ( Samyutta-Nikaya 56:11). Translations: palikanon.de ; English by Peter Harvey , Ñanamoli Thera , Piyadassi Thera , Thanissaro Bhikkhu
- ↑ The longer discourse on the parable of the elephant trail - Mahāhatthipadopama Sutta, M 28. Translations by Zumwinkel. palikanon.com, accessed December 11, 2018 .
- ^ Dukkha , a listing of the printouts in English and German