I used to believe the Three Marks were universal. Now to me, they would not be universal, if one’s definition of suffering is mental, including all psychosomatic illness, which I think is the majority if physical suffering.
For me the Buddha ended all suffering under the Bodhi tree (and any arahant has ended all suffering), and there is no suffering inherent in the Five Aggregates. It is the Five clung-to Aggregates that are suffering (vis the summary sentence of the First Noble Truth), which are taken as permanent (and one’s essence/soul/spirit) in some way. These are mind made aggregates, made due to clinging, not the Five Aggregates, as they truly are.
Therefore the Five Aggregates of an Arahant are only impermanent and not soul/essence spirit and only the Five clung-to Aggregates are impermanent, suffering and not soul.
My understanding of the Buddha’s teachings has changed, matured, and deepened over the past years—and continues to change, week by week. I’m still a beginner though.
When I first came to Buddhism, I thought Buddhist ethics were deontological. There is some flexibility, I thought, but basically, a Buddhist should live in accordance with the ethical rules laid down by the Buddha. I understood this “should” as a deontological obligation that came with the Buddhist path. Doing good and avoiding harm could be achieved by adhering to those obligations.
At that time, the only things I knew about Buddhism were the EBTs translated on Access to Insight. I didn’t know how Buddhism was practiced. One day I was reading Wikipedia’s article on the five hindrances. I noticed that Ajahn Brahm was often mentioned, which got me curious: who is Ajahn Brahm? Needless to say, one thing led to another, and now I’m here, on Discuss & Discover.
Anyway, from there my understanding of early Buddhist ethics shifted to something closer to virtue ethics, with an important role for intention. A Buddhist should develop and cultivate Buddhist virtues, like generosity and harmlessness, which, if properly developed, open up possibilities for reaching immersion. These virtues form the core of sīla.
Recently, however, I listened to the lectures of the 2013 early Buddhism course, in which Venerable Sujato made the case for understanding Buddhist ethics as utilitarian, an approach explicated in Ven Sujato’s 2011 blog post Vardy vs. the Buddha. It made sense to me after some reflection. The importance of virtues and intentions is ultimately derived from their consequences: do they lead to more happiness and peace, or less? It’s hard to judge without sufficient wisdom, hence teachings like the five precepts, which can help us find our way to peace and happiness.
I used to think it was only possible to progress on the path but I now see that it’s possible to digress or regress on the path. Used to think a robe might mean more virtue or wisdom however this doesn’t seem to be true sometimes.
This is something I’ve experienced, too. In my case, as a former Catholic, I think it’s a holdover from pre-Vatican II ideas that the ordained are Holy by virtue of their ordination. In both, the reality is that the ordained are human and potentially subject to all that human-ness entails. It can be tough, though, when we feel a deep need for an inspirational example of living dhamma, to accept that.
I am reading Analayos book on craving :
‘Such happiness is a “divine happiness”,dibba sukha, with which all interest in the vulgar happiness of sensuality ceases (MN I 504).’
Proficiency jhana does not necessarily mean peoples interest in sensual pleasure decreases based on my observation and this is at odds with the above. I guess that’s what I was getting at.
Again, please use other topics to discuss each others’ views. Here I envision people describing their personal shifts. If we don’t understand what they mean it’s okay to ask of course, but I’d like to encourage expressing views that others don’t agree with. Discussions would sidetrack the topic into specifics…
A lot of ‘religion’ including Buddhism as a religion do think in those terms - but in reality it is a gradual progression from having defilements to removal of them.
I thought that the texts described the full practice, however suttas like the Anapanasati sutta seems to describe states after the five hindrances have been reduced or removed, or doesn’t feel it is the appropriate place to deal with the issue. No one has sat down and not had hindrances arising as emotions or hindrances giving rise to random thoughts, in the mind. Preliminary practices are sometimes not included.
