Ending suffering is ending life?

buddhist treasure life since not killing is one of the precept but it seems buddhist are trying to end life by not continuing it ? Because to them life is dukkha . And there is no other alternative , no ?

No life is not dukkha. To live means to breath. You can live and have experience without craving and dukkha. You can also live without experience or very little experience as in nirodha samapatti.

The purpose of dhamma is to live happily.

If by “not continuing it” you mean not having children, there will always be puthujjanas so as long as there’s puthujjana’s there’s likely to be children, not to mention lay buddhists.

4 Likes

Nope. The cause of dukkha is Craving, not Life.

aj quote

6 Likes

Remember rebirth exists and non arahants are subjected to rebirth.

The value of living is to practice to attain to enlightenment, as well as killing is bad kamma.

However, valuing life doesn’t mean we value more future rebirth for oneself.

We sort of are like the antinatalist, but done right in that we know how to properly end rebirth is via the dhamma. Antinatalist believe that since life is suffering, most ethical position is to not bring new life to earth.

They forgot about rebirth. Thus their strategy of just not having kids doesn’t work. They will get reborn elsewhere if they don’t become arahant in this life. And the beings who would otherwise become their kids would still get reborn elsewhere and suffer.

As to the statement life is suffering, one should know how to properly read this. It’s not commonly taught to beginners as it’s easily misunderstood.

The Buddha said the 5 aggregates of clinging are suffering. Well, in a sense, even arahants are suffering for having a body, bodily pain, but they are the best we can hope for for a life without suffering. The thing is, they are not able to be reborn again. So yes, there’s no alternative in the manner. Unless you believe in Mahayana who believes that bhumi 8 of Bodhisatta is where arahants would be when they choose to become a bodhisattva and can choose to be reborn again out of compassion to train on to become a Buddha and can hang out in samsara (but not mentally suffer, like arahant) until all beings are saved. Some Mahayana doctrine even has guan Yin as a Buddha long time ago, but choose to become bhumi 10 bodhisattva again to help people. Anyway, you can ask mahayana Buddhist for more. I cannot make sense of it.

Beginner who might go into depression due to misunderstanding life is suffering, don’t tell them life is suffering. Especially when they don’t believe in rebirth yet, it’s very dangerous. In case you, the reader is one of these beginners, suicide doesn’t end suffering, don’t do it.

For more advanced people, we need to focus on perception of pervasive suffering. All conditioned phenomenon are suffering. That is the key to disillusionment, dispassion, liberation. So life is suffering is a reasonable summary.

5 Likes

If life is not dukkha what is the point and reason of renunciation and seeking liberation ? If the purpose of dhamma is to live happily (this is an error because the dhamma is just to end dukkha) , thats means it implied there is dukkha in life isnt it .

And what is dukkha ? Can there be a life permanently without dukkha ? Isnt that life itself is the whole mass of dukkha .

Bingo :point_left:

This is where buddhist may have contradicted themselves . But thats how many buddhists “accepted” it unsightedly .

Why , you assumed i am a mahayanist ?

Not to worry , many peoples are not buddhist yet they think life is suffering and they commited suicide without knowing buddhism at all . And there are many advanced monks commited suicides .

1 Like

Dhukka may appear in life. Life gives the potential for Dhukka to appear. But life itself is not suffering, because there are people who live and yet do not suffer.

1 Like

To stop dukkha, which is it’s own thing, particularly mood and feeling. As the Buddha said he teaches the dhamma for those who feel. The dead do not feel.

There is dukkha in the default state of living, but that’s not life. Life is an open sandbox, which can be changed.

No, it’s not an an “error”, there’s several suttas where the Buddha and other Arahants say Nibbana is happiness.

Now, the Blessed One has said that whatever is an affliction is stress. So by this line of reasoning it may be known how Unbinding is pleasant

AN 9.34

When wanderers who follow other paths say this, you should say to them: ‘Reverends, when the Buddha describes what’s included in happiness, he’s not just referring to pleasant feeling. The Realized One describes pleasure as included in happiness wherever it’s found, and in whatever context.’”

SN 36.19

But I am capable of experiencing perfect happiness for one day and night without moving my body or speaking. I am capable of experiencing perfect happiness for two days … three days … four days … five days … six days … seven days. What do you think, reverends? This being so, who lives in greater pleasure, King Bimbisāra or I?’

‘This being so, Venerable Gotama lives in greater pleasure than King Bimbisāra.’”

MN 14

4 Likes

Good to know though :smile: and are there some other than are arahants in the list ?

So , you are saying there is dukkha in living but not in life , which is ? But then birth and rebirth again is not dukkha ! :upside_down_face:

You shouldn’t gloss over words. I said default state, meaning 3 poisons and ignorance.

Okay , sorry , do you mind expand a bit Is there a thing called “default state” ? I thought 3 poisons included ignorance .

Well unless you’re an Ariya, everyone has the 3 poisons and ignorance, so it is the default state.

As for your second question, that’s a separate topic that’s been covered here How do delusions arise and what is the best way to tackle them? - #6 by Mike_0123

So what is the difference by saying life is suffering , when living beings are not exempted from dukkha . An arahant continues to live on for a short period then full stops , arahant are but wearing out its previous karma .

Why would you want future rebirth? It means not attaining to arahanthood in this life. Thus another death in the next life.

Ok, from your wordings, you’re before beginners, not even a Buddhist yet. So I couldn’t count on you believing in rebirth. Thus, ignore the life is suffering part. You’ll likely just take the wrong conclusion from it.

You really cannot evaluate Buddhism without taking rebirth seriously and see how much suffering there is in samsara. Hell is a real place which can be reborn into for anyone who is not yet a stream enterer. Samsara is scary and very rare to get back a human rebirth.

Life is invaluable , if you ends it (by ending dukkha) , you will lose something valuable beyond estimation isnt it . Thats why i say there is contradiction in that concept .

Killing is advised against because kindness is essential to developing on the path. The striving to end rebirth is because all conditioned things are dukkha. The two are not connected through value judgements on life itself.

The sheer depth and pervasiveness of dukkha is something most of us can’t grasp (yet).

Until more and more things disappear in your meditation, its not possible to see how they’re dukkha. It’s like if a song has been playing in your ears your whole life, you don’t realize how draining it has been until one day it stops. Likewise when some of the senses disappear in deep meditation, you see for the first time how oppressive they’ve been all along. Then you know that all of sense experience pales in comparison to the higher happiness that’s possible on this path.

So yes, life is dukkha, but so is every other conditioned thing including death and birth. And this is not a pessimistic denial of the happiness we can have in life. But its a full acknowledgement of the scope of suffering. And we are extremely fortunate to be presented with a path to end suffering. Ending suffering is ending rebirth through the noble eightfold path.

Oh yes , two (life n ending dukkha) are deeply connected for sure .

Life is all included isnt it .

:handshake:

My point is that the reasons behind not killing and ending rebirth are different. So there is no contraction between them.

1 Like

I am not saying just killing alone itself , but life itself is very precious . :grinning:

But is it? According to the doctrine of rebirth, when this one ends, you get another. How is that precious?

The problem is that the next life might be worse, much worse, depending on kamma.

If you end your own life or that of another being, you will only be increasing the chances that your future birth will be a bad one. Conversely, by refraining from killing you are increasing the chances that your future birth will be a good one.

Now, ‘human life’, is a different matter. Human life can be said to be precious because it affords us the opportunity of practicing dhamma and gaining stream-entry. By gaining stream-entry, we guarantee that any future life will be a good one, until we attain liberation.

I’ll drop in SN 45.165 into the mix as well for a perspective on the forms of suffering that are addressed by the path.

1 Like

Often, discussions benefit from a clarification of terms. Would you be able to say what you mean by life?

For example, do you consider only humans to be alive, or do you include devas and hungry ghosts? How about a being born in the plane of neither perception nor non-perception? These beings experience very little. Are they alive?

If so, what do these beings have in common that makes their life precious?