SQA National 5 Religious, Moral and Philosophical Studies

Buddhists believe that to understand how to live well you first have to understand what the world is actually like. The Buddha taught that everything conditioned has three characteristics, that these lead to a kind of suffering which has a cause and an end, and that the cause lies in three mental states which keep people unhappy and stuck in the cycle of rebirth. The terms below are given in Pali, which is the language of the Theravada scriptures; Sanskrit forms such as dukkha, anatman and nirvana appear in Mahayana writing.

The Three Marks of Existence

The Three Marks of Existence (tilakkhana) are anicca, dukkha and anatta. Buddhists hold that they are true of all conditioned things, which means everything that comes about because of causes and conditions.

Anicca: impermanence

Anicca means that nothing stays the same. Mountains erode, relationships change, bodies age and thoughts arise and pass within seconds. A person at fifty is not the same as the child they were, and even in a single day the body and mind are constantly changing. Buddhists do not say that change is bad; they say that it is a fact, and that suffering comes from trying to make things last when they cannot.

Dukkha: suffering and unsatisfactoriness

Dukkha is usually translated as suffering, but it covers more than pain. Traditional teaching describes three kinds. Ordinary suffering is the pain of illness, injury, grief and death. The suffering of change is the way happy moments end, so that even a pleasant experience carries the worry that it will disappear. The suffering of conditioned existence is a background unease that comes from living in a world where nothing can be relied on to last. The Buddha taught that birth, old age, sickness and death are all dukkha, as is being parted from what we love and being stuck with what we dislike.

Anatta: no fixed self

Anatta means that there is no permanent, unchanging self or soul. A person is made up of five parts, called the five aggregates (khandhas): physical form, feelings, perceptions, mental formations such as habits and intentions, and consciousness. None of these is a self, and they are all changing all the time. The sense of being a single fixed "I" is a useful way of speaking, but Buddhists believe it is an illusion, and holding on to it causes selfishness and suffering. This is one of the main differences between Buddhism and religions which teach that each person has an eternal soul.

How the three are connected

The three marks explain each other. Everything is impermanent (anicca), so nothing we depend on for happiness, including our own body and mind, can last. Because we cling to things as though they would last, and to an idea of a self that stays the same, we are bound to be disappointed, and that disappointment is dukkha. The lack of a fixed self (anatta) is the reason attachment to "mine" and "me" makes no sense, since there is no unchanging thing to protect. Seeing one mark clearly leads to seeing the others, and understanding all three is the beginning of wisdom.

The Four Noble Truths

The Buddha is said to have taught the Four Noble Truths in his first sermon, at the Deer Park in Sarnath, after his enlightenment. They are often compared to a doctor's approach: a diagnosis, the cause, the prognosis and the treatment.

1. The truth of dukkha: life involves suffering and dissatisfaction.
2. The truth of the cause of dukkha (samudaya): suffering is caused by craving or thirst (tanha).
3. The truth of the end of dukkha (nirodha): suffering can end, and the state in which it has ended is nibbana.
4. The truth of the path (magga): the way to end suffering is the Noble Eightfold Path.

The second truth names three kinds of craving: craving for sense pleasures, craving to become or be something, and craving to be rid of what is unwelcome, which includes craving not to exist. Craving is what makes a person cling, and clinging keeps them tied to the cycle of birth, death and rebirth. The third truth is a message of hope, because it says that suffering is not the end of the story. The fourth truth is practical: it does not ask for belief but for a way of living, which is described in the Eightfold Path.

The Four Noble Truths are linked to the Three Marks. Dukkha is the first truth and the second mark, and the craving of the second truth is a response to impermanence and to the belief in a fixed self.

The Three Poisons

The Three Poisons (also called the three roots or the three fires) are the three mental states that Buddhists believe lie behind craving and so behind most unskilful action. They are:

• greed or attachment (lobha), the wanting that never feels satisfied;
• hatred or aversion (dosa), anger and ill will towards people or things we dislike;
• delusion or ignorance (moha), not seeing things as they really are, in particular not seeing the Three Marks.

In the Tibetan wheel of life, a picture of the cycle of rebirth, the three poisons are shown at the hub as three animals chasing each other round: a cockerel for greed, a snake for hatred and a pig for delusion. Their position at the centre shows that they drive the whole cycle. Delusion is often treated as the root of the other two, since a person who truly saw that nothing lasts and that there is no fixed self would have little reason to grasp or to hate.

Buddhists believe each poison has an antidote: generosity (dana) counters greed, loving-kindness (metta) counters hatred, and wisdom (panna) counters delusion. Actions that come from the poisons create unskilful kamma, and actions that come from their opposites create skilful kamma, so the poisons are also the reason bad actions are followed by unhappy results.

Why this matters in a Buddhist life

A Buddhist who recognises greed in themselves, for example when a purchase is wanted more than it is needed, tries to notice the craving and let it pass instead of acting on it. In meditation they practise watching anger rise and fade, which teaches them that it is a passing state and not part of who they are. In this way the teachings on existence become practical, and followers believe that the contribution of these ideas is a calmer mind, kinder behaviour and a more realistic way of facing loss and death.