CJ Articles
The Four Noble Truths
(In the Context of Mindfulness Meditation)
A Dhamma talk delivered by Venerable Dhammasami on 13th April 2003 at the residence of Thida Win in Los Angeles, USA
Introduction
Joseph Goldstein stated in his book “Insight Meditation”, that the outward appearance of various Buddhist schools who have come to the West is that they neither seem to know much, let alone understand about what each of them does in their respective monasteries and centres. Each has a unique way of doing things. If a Burmese Buddhist were to participate in a Tibetan pUjA (service), he would be as puzzled as an American attending it. Likewise, Laotian Buddhists also have their distinct tradition and culture. When they recite their parittas they light candles made of bees wax. Thais and Burmese also have their own traditions. The Burmese, for example, say awkatha, a formulae asking for forgiveness before observing the Five Precepts. The Thais, however, may ask for forgiveness at the end and they may say so in PAli. But these differences are merely at a cultural level.
However, Joseph Goldstein said that he was heartened by the fact that they all knew what the Four Noble Truths are. The Four Noble Truths are not only the central theme of the Buddha’s teaching but also the common teaching among all these schools and traditions. So, this shows how important it is for us to understand the Four Noble Truths. We need to understand not only what the Buddha taught but also what all the traditions are about.
Culture and Dhamma
Today, I want to discuss this issue; the fact that the Four Noble Truths surpass culture and tradition. In general we may be able to separate out what is culture and what is Dhamma, but sometimes it may present a problem. Here the Four Noble Truths by itself is Dhamma, the pure essence of Buddhism.
In His first sermon, the Dhammacakkapavattana Sutta, all the Buddha talked about was the Four Noble Truths. And, at the end of the sermon, He stated that He had expounded the Dhamma, completely and in full (svakkhAto dhammo). So, really, whatever happens to the other suttas that were preached thereafter, if the Dhammacakkapavattana Sutta survives and the Four Noble Truths are still taught in the various schools of Buddhism, then the sAsana (Buddha’s teaching) will continue to exist.
Buddhist religious scriptures were written long after the Buddha delivered His sermons, and in spite of the best efforts to preserve them throughout the centuries, there may have been mistakes in recording and copying, The PAli Buddhist scriptures were written a few hundred years after the Buddha passed away. This is not unique to Buddhism. The Bible was written only about 200 years after the death of Jesus Christ. The Koran, divided into 28 chapters, was not written while the Prophet Mohammed was still alive, but was committed to memory and passed on orally. The earliest Hindu scriptures, the Bhagavagita, were written only in the 18th Century. Prior to this it was also committed to memory. Even then, the writing was not done by the Indians but by a German professor.
The religious scriptures are there for you to study, investigate and form your own opinion. But you should not reject or accept them straight away. The Buddha said to Kondannya, one of the Five Friends, “Ehi bhikkhu,” meaning “Come bhikkhu and study the dhamma”. He was invited to examine it for himself. In the First Sermon the Buddha also talked about how to completely overcome dukkha (suffering). So it is important to understand the sutta properly.
One of the Burmese participants of a meditation retreat in Birmingham said that she had been to Amaravati, the Warwick monastery and other English Theravada Buddhist monasteries where they would always teach and discuss the Four Noble Truths, which made her quite pleased. But at the same time she also felt that it was too elementary. Well, in Burma, because of this kind of opinion some monks don’t dare to give sermons about the Four Noble Truths because they fear people might not think too highly of them if they do so. Instead they choose to give sermons on other less known suttas just to impress lay people. And more often than not because the people don’t understand what has been said, they usually say “SAdhu” and go home without commenting on what had been preached.
Here in the West, you may be asked what Buddhism is about, or what you believe in if, as you say, you don’t believe in God. The American daga (lay Buddhist disciple) who came yesterday was telling me about his personal experiences when he went to Burma. He said that he did whatever he was asked to do by his Burmese girlfriend. That was out of politeness but he did not understand what was going on. He also told them that he did not want to pretend to understand.
So I explained to him that in Burma there are two things. One is culture and the other is dhamma. The majority of the Burmese people have difficulty in differentiating these two. I gave him an example. When we prostrate ourselves three times, this is our Burmese culture. But looking at it from the dhamma point of view, we are doing it to get rid of our pride/arrogance. (NivAto ca in the MaNgala Sutta means to be humble is a blessing.)
When people have pride, they end up fighting and arguing with each other. “I told you so,” is often said because you want to score a point against the other person. You also don’t have respect for the other person. So, to get rid of our pride/arrogance is the dhamma. This is introduced to us in a cultural form; a very subtle, civilised and also educational way, by prostrating ourselves three times. In general no one would like to prostrate himself, but by doing so, he is weakening his pride. It also means that he accepts the fact that he has pride. So the practice of prostrating oneself three times is a Burmese culture, but when we do so mindfully with the knowledge that we have pride and we are trying to reduce this pride by prostrating ourselves, then we are also practising the Dhamma.
Sometimes we may prostrate ourselves in front of a monk but end up having an argument with him, or prostrate ourselves in front of our parents but end up fighting with them. This is because we are following a cultural practice alone, but forgetting its Dhamma essence.
A French religious sociologist, Louis du Mont, used the term routinisation to describe this, because the practice has just become a routine. When we wake up in the morning and before we go to bed at night, we usually prostrate ourselves three times as a routine. I remember as a young novice, when we had to say our prayers en masse in the monastery, I would recite the parittas by heart from beginning to end without making one mistake. I wouldn’t even know when it ended because it had become a routine and my mind wasn’t in it. So it is very important to be aware of what is in your mind. If you lose this awareness you will lose the Dhamma and will be left with just the culture. You will just retain the shell. However, culture is also very important because every time you prostrate yourself and you remember that you are trying to eradicate your pride, you develop mindfulness, you become meditative and progress in the practice of the Dhamma.
The Truth or Dhamma
The Four Noble Truths are called truths because it holds true for everyone. If something is true only for the Burmese and not for the Westerners, then it is not the truth. Something that is true only for Americans and not for Arabs is not the truth. On the 19th of March when I was at Harvard University, a student said, “Sir, you have given a sermon on metta (loving-kindness) and taught us metta meditation. What do you suggest that we do with the imminent war between Iraq and the U.S.?” I told him that there wasn’t anything that I could do to stop the war. Students at Harvard are mostly against the war, so I said that if every time you see the White House you get upset, you will have a war in Baghdad, which is outside you and another war inside yourself. The least we can do is to stop the war in our heart.
When you meet a person you dislike and you become angry, that anger will make you tense and unhappy. When President Bush hears the name Saddam Hussein, he will become unhappy and vice versa. But if they were to forget the names and focus only on their anger, it is possible for that anger to change to metta and karuna (compassion), because they share a common experience, anger. And with that they may be able to relate to each other. Taking the experience impersonally, they could experience metta, instead of dosa (anger), and at least they could maintain peace and harmony in their own minds. When you are in that state of mind, then you are ready to help. What I mean is, when there is the fear of defeat, there will be tension, and this is common to both sides. This is what the Buddha meant by dukkha. This dukkha has no national, gender or age boundary. It is common to us all. People fight when they forget this common dukkha exists in everyone.
The Meaning of Dukkha
When I was in Ottawa on my way to visit a Thai forest monastery, a Bangladeshi Buddhist advised me not to talk about dukkha because, he said, “Only we (Asians) have dukkha”. So I replied, “No, even the Canadian Prime Minister has dukkha”. He said that he did not believe that. “The Prime Minster has a huge salary. He has many secretaries and drivers. He has loads of security around him” the gentleman continued. I interrupted, “The fact that he needs security around him shows that he is frightened. I don’t have security. I don’t need it. And when I look at him I feel quite sorry for him. He can’t go out for walks in the morning like I do. He can’t go to a bookshop like I do. He can’t do things freely. This is his dukkha.”
The important thing to note here is that just like the Bangladeshi daga was unable to see this dukkha, there are things that make dukkha obscure. Out of these the main culprit is our personalisation; thinking that only I have dukkha; not the Canadian Prime Minister. Only Saddam has dukkha and not Bush. In PAli, this personalisation is called “atta”. When this atta obscures our perception, we don’t see dukkha. Even if we see dukkha, we only see it as “my dukkha.” Sometimes we may even regard this dukkha as sukkha (pleasure).
Burmese people usually get frightened by the word dukkha because they always equate it with problems and trouble. So the word dukkha sounds too pessimistic and I am advised not to talk about it too often. But the Buddha used the word dukkha and talked about dukkha throughout His life. Yet I believe He was one of the happiest persons in the world. Unhappiness has nothing to do with talking about dukkha.
What do we mean by dukkha? In very simple terms, anything that takes away happiness or peace is dukkha. When you meditate and your knee starts to hurt, you may start feeling angry or distressed. When this happens, there is no peace, no happiness, no calmness and this is what we mean by dukkha. However, pain doesn’t always cause distress. There may be times while meditating that a pain arises, but you don’t feel distressed. The Buddha called the pain that arises dukkha vedanA (physical sensation) and its appearance does not necessarily lead to distress in our minds. When we observe the arising dukkha vedanA mindfully, we don’t get frustrated, impatient, tensed, angry or disappointed. Sometimes you may. In other words when physical pain arises mental distress may or may not occur. So how do you prevent the mental distress? This is what the Buddha was trying to teach. If you don’t get what you want you become unhappy. But there are also times when you don’t feel unhappy even though you don’t get what you want. So what is the difference?
Once, the Buddha was invited to spend a vassa (the rains retreat) in Veranja by the governor of that town. The Buddha went there with his huge entourage of sanghas. Unfortunately the governor forgot about his invitation and failed to provide food to the Buddha and His disciples. It was only after three months had passed that he remembered. During this period, the Buddha and His disciples had to go out on alms rounds for food. Because there were not many devotees of the Buddha in that area, there were few donors and being a place where merchants usually set up camp, the food that was donated consisted of broken left-over rice grains and corn that were used as horse feed. The Buddha and His disciples survived on that for three whole months and did not blame the governor for it. Neither did they blame their kamma for their hardship. This is very important, especially because Burmese people have a tendency to blame their kamma for any misfortune they encounter. The fact that they didn’t blame anyone is also important to note because it shows that they did not harbour any feelings of anger. When there is no anger then mettA grows naturally. When the governor remembered and brought alms food, the Buddha accepted and gave a sermon as though nothing had happened. The Buddha was able to discuss the dhamma as He was able to keep Himself calm. This story is narrated in the introduction of the Vinaya PiTaka (Monastic Rules). When I read about it when I was studying the Vinaya, my respect and admiration for the Buddha grew. Over 1600 years ago, the aTThakathA Sayadaws (the commentator-monks) prophesised that one day, monks will even complain when they have wholesome good food presented to them.
So what is dukkha? Is it eating the rough broken rice grains and corn? Or is it not having a MacDonald’s meal or complaining of a dish that needs a bit more tomatoes? If a person complains like this, it shows that he is dissatisfied in some way. This is dukkha. This type of dukkha is seen in everyone and everyday. This dukkha arises because we lack awareness.
So pleasure can also be seen as dukkha. Why do we seek pleasure? Children around the ages of 18 and 19 years have high ambitions and expectations. When their expectations are not met, they become frustrated and when they don’t know how to handle their frustration. They only know they are unhappy. They start looking for pleasure just to get away from that unhappiness. They may listen to very loud music. They try and resolve their internal conflict by seeking refuge in something outside. Then they may go to a disco and because of the change in the environment, their mind gets distracted. But this may work only for the first few times. Soon they need to try something different to get away from the unhappiness. They start using alcohol, which helps them forget their frustration. This also works only for a short period and may gradually lead to excessive drinking. Next, they realise that dancing for 10 or 15 minutes in a disco is not enough any more and they need to dance for a few hours to distract them from their frustrations. What is happening here is that the frustration that they are experiencing is within them and the pleasure that they are seeking is outside. The seeking for a relief is itself dukkha, and the relief that one gets is only short-lived. Eventually alcohol is not sufficient to provide relief so they turn to drugs to give themselves a boost of energy or a sense of pleasure. Similarly, drugs only provide relief temporarily and they end up abusing drugs in the quest for pleasure. They started first of all running away from the unhappiness, but end up pretty much with the same thing.
The habit becomes a vicious cycle with mental distress leading to physical suffering and physical suffering leading to more mental distress. Later on you can’t determine what is the cause and what is the effect. I remember a poem written by a Burmese astrologer, also a poet, from Pegu that I read when I was young. It was about two athletes running on a circular track in a race. One had completed a circuit already whilst the other was still near the halfway mark. If you arrived at this point as a spectator, you would not be able to tell who was in the lead. It is just like being unable to tell how the dukkha began in the first place.
The Buddha stated that the question of how the world was created is not relevant to our dukkha. It just trivialises the dukkha that we have, which is the burning question at the moment. The feelings of disappointment, dissatisfaction, frustration, envy and jealousy, all of these are dukkha. Wherever we go, this dukkha follows us whether we live in the USA, UK or Burma. So we all have dukkha but may not be aware of it. This ignorance is also dukkha according to the Buddha. Once you realise dukkha as dukkha, then it stops being dukkha and becomes bearable. If you are still ignorant of dukkha as dukkha, then you compound the dukkha.
The First Noble Truth – Dukkha SaccA
Buddha stated as the First Noble Truth that dukkha exists in this world. We need to understand the word dukkha properly and within our day-to-day context. This is a statement of the truth that there is dukkha or suffering. This wisdom is also called saccA nana or the knowledge that dukkha exists. Nana means knowing and saccA means things as they really are.
Dukkha is just like a plant that grows from a seed. If there is a cause, the effect will follow. But just as a seed is produced by the plant, both cause and effect do not always stay as they are. An effect can become a cause and vice versa. The father gives birth to a son and the son in turn becomes a father later to produce a grandson. Cause and effect become linked like this. So what is the cause or what is the effect becomes relative to what you are talking about.
AvijjA paccayA saNkharA, saNkhara paccayA viGGABaM, Relative to avijjA (ignorance), saNkhara (volition or effort) becomes the effect. But relative to viGGaBa (consciousness), saNkhara becomes the cause. This is called the process of conditioning. This process of conditioning is in constant motion, revolving endlessly. Dukkha also arises in this way.
The Second Noble Truth – Dukkha Samudaya SaccA
The cause of dukkha is called samudaya. So the cause is samudaya and the effect is dukkha. In His sermon, the Buddha talked about the effect first before talking about the cause because the cause is a bit more difficult to understand. To find out the cause, we need to search for it or investigate it. When doctors see a patient they identify the symptom first, i.e. stomach ache or headache. Next they search for the cause by observation and investigation. The Buddha gave His sermon just like that. He was very practical. He was not describing how things happened but how we come to understand things. If we were to look at how things happened, then samudaya would come first. If the cause of the illness can be eradicated, then the illness will disappear.
The Third Noble Truth – Dukkha Nirodha SaccA
The end of a process is called nirodha and dukkha nirodha saccA means the truth of the cessation of dukkha. We will see shortly what it means.
The Fourth Noble Truth – Magga SaccA
The way to end dukkha, the treatment, the medicines used, is called dukkha nirodha gAminI paTipadA. PaTipadA means the path and gAminI means leading to. In other words it means the path leading to the cessation of dukkha. In short it is called magga saccA. In the PAli text you will find the word dukkha in front.
The Four Noble Truths
- Dukkha sacca
- Dukkha samudaya sacca
- Dukkha nirodha sacca
- Magga sacca (consisting of the eight constituents)
If you regard 1 and 2 as the dark side of life, then 3 and 4 can be regarded as the bright side of life. If you talk only about the bright side and not the dark side, then it cannot be a truth or saccA. It would not be complete to just talk about the causes of the bad things and not mention anything about how to overcome them. In this sermon everything is there. It is complete. What is the problem? It is dukkha. How is it caused? There is an end to dukkha and how does one achieve this? All this is explained in the Sermon.
All the practice of Buddhism is included in this sermon, in the Four Noble Truths. 1 and 2 are related as cause and effect, but 3 and 4 are not. If you think carefully, you will understand that by practising 4 or treading the path, by practising the Eightfold Path, it leads to the cessation of dukkha. So number 4 is merely a path to be followed. To give an example, there is a road from Phoenix to Los Angeles. But the road is not the cause of Los Angeles. The road does not produce the city. It just leads to it. In other words, nibbAna is the state where cause and effect cease to exist. As long as a cause is there, an effect will follow. The reason why dukkha and samudaya are collectively known as saMsAra is because they are both cycling according to the law of cause and effect. If nibbAna had a cause, then it would also be in a cycle. If God created man, then there must be someone who created God. Otherwise, the creation theory lacks a credible logic. It is just like that. So 3 and 4 are not related as cause and effect. If you follow the path, then the cause and effect cycle ceases. When the cause of dukkha ceases, then you call that nibbAna.
If we contemplate on the dukkha that we face in our daily life; the dukkha of anger, jealousy, envy, etc., they are constantly there. Then there is the dukkha of uncertainty, anxiety, boredom, frustration and restlessness. It is this restlessness that makes us rearrange our furniture. Once they are moved things appear different, but a few days later it starts to look boring again. So you move things around again. You are never satisfied. You think the problem is the big sofa, so you move it. You don’t realise that the problem is within you. When you keep your eyes open, you only see the problems outside. That is why the Buddha instructs us to shut our eyes when we meditate so that our focus automatically shifts to what is in our mind. The SatipaTThAna Sutta always mentions outside and inside problems (ajjhattaM vA bahiddhA vA ajjhatta-bahiddhA vA) at the end of all the fourteen chapters.
So you can apply the Four Noble Truths to your restlessness or anger. First, you need to recognise restlessness or anger. Next, understand the cause of your restlessness or anger. Then, follow the practice or path leading to the eradication of restlessness or anger. Eventually there will be cessation of restlessness or anger. The Buddha called this vedanA (feelings and emotions) nirodha gAminI paTipadA. So the Four Noble Truths can be seen everywhere.
The Four Noble Truths and Sati
Using mindfulness meditation we need to explore the Four Noble Truths. What we need to do is to observe dukkha by ourselves. We regard lobha (greed), dosa (anger), mAna (pride), etc. as dukkha. Is there a place where there is no dukkha? Due to the concept that there must be place where there is no dukkha, people look for this place. A fellow monk once jokingly said that every day he prays three times and sends his application for nibbAna. But so far, he hasn’t received a reply. Well, how can anyone request a thing like that from the Buddha?
So what should we do? Should we run away from dukkha? When people go to pubs or discos because they feel frustrated, they are just running away from their dukkha. They start seeing staying at home as dukkha. If you stop going to school because you have been scolded by the teacher, that means you are running away as well. This is a very common response. The Buddha pointed out that since time immemorial, people have been running away from their dukkha, yet dukkha continues to exist. In other words, that solution doesn’t work.
The Buddha said that you have to face it. So when we meditate, and anger arises, we should see it as dukkha and accept the fact that we have anger. We have to confront that anger, that frustration, etc. We need some courage to do that. Our natural instinct is to run away. Our anger, restlessness and frustration makes us want to get up and leave; give up the meditation. It is quite a powerful urge. In order to be able to resist this, the Buddha exhorts us to develop mindfulness or sati. This is also called bala in PAli, meaning energy, strength, courage or power.
So first, we must not run away from dukkha. When we observe vedanA or pain, and contrary to expectation, it increases, we feel like giving up. We might lose our courage. In order to help us confront this dukkha, the Buddha gives us a weapon, and this weapon is sati (mindfulness). This sati is the foundation to everything. The word foundation in PAli is paTThAna. So SatipaTThAna means mindfulness as a foundation. Sayadaw U Silananda uses this word foundation in his book.
Sati is both a foundation as well as a leading factor. I think I have mentioned this in my book “Different Aspects of Mindfulness”. When we go into battle, we need a person to lead us. In Thai, the word patthan means a chairman or a person who controls or supervises. In short the Buddhist way to solve problems is to confront them and to be able to do this you have to equip yourselves with sati. Once you have sati other qualities like samadhi start to develop themselves.
When we have a headache and we are mindful of it, we will take the necessary steps to get rid of it. We first accept the fact that we have a headache. If we don’t accept it we will not do anything about it and it will not get better. If we have an illness but don’t accept it, we will not take any medicine to get better. The illness will get worse. So sati also has to do with acceptance of what is happening. At the time that we are having a headache, it is the truth that the headache exists and we have to accept it. As the saying goes, “The truth can be painful”. But we have no choice. We have to recognise it. This acceptance is one aspect of sati.
Then we continuously observe mindfully and this is another aspect of sati. With continued observation you get a better understanding. For example when observing a pain in your knee, you might expect the pain to disappear. But it does not. Now you are awakening to what is happening. You become aware of your opinion and your attitude towards the pain. In fact the word “Buddha” means awakening. The Buddha, of course, gained wisdom on all aspects of the universe without the help of a teacher and became awakened, and that is why we call him “Samma Sambuddha”. The Burmese word that we use often is “Buddhabatha” or Buddhist religion. So if we are not aware of or awakened to what is happening to us, then it is difficult to call ourselves Buddhists. The most important quality of being a Buddhist is to be awakened to things as they are, to reality.
So if we expect the pain in our knee to disappear and we are not aware of our expectation, we will feel very upset when it doesn’t. We become disappointed having waited for it to go away for a long time. We also get impatient for it to subside. Expectation, disappointment, impatience, frustration, anger; all these start to multiply. But when we have sati and observe this process, we realise how they all develop and progress; just like a scientist discovering the process and causes of a disease. The understanding comes gradually, little by little. This is the awakening process. This is the essence of meditation, to observe, to understand and to be awakened. (What will be the ultimate goal?) I can’t pre-empt it. There is no beginning or end. There is just formation and disintegration. For a yogi, what is important to know is not where the dukkha originates from but how it arises. So when you observe the vedanA (pain) too closely and don’t distance yourself from it, you personalise the pain without realising it. You may start comparing yourself to others; why am I experiencing this while all the other meditators are sitting so calmly? So to prevent yourself from doing that, while your samAdhi (concentration) is not yet well developed, you should just pay recognition to the pain for a short while only and return your focus to your breathing.
This acknowledgement or acceptance is the first step of mindfulness. Later on you will be able to observe the vedanA for a much longer period without dukkha (frustration, impatience, etc.) arising in your mind. Then you will start to understand its true nature. The pain may arise and may subside or disappear by itself. That is the nature of formation and disintegration. You come to realise it only by observation, not by talking about it. When you start seeing this phenomenon of formation and disintegration rather than the experience of vedanA (pain) then your awakening is complete. This realisation or wisdom that you now attain is like a weapon that eradicates the root of causation. Of course, now we are still in the early stages and similar to just starting to rub off years of accumulated grime and dirt. We need to rub away constantly with sati (mindfulness) because if we stop we will just accumulate the grime again.
Wisdom
So what do we need to do with the First Noble Truth of Dukkha SaccA? We have to recognise and accept dukkha. Then we have to understand it. This wisdom is called kiccaGABa. GABa means comprehension; the understanding that dukkha is not something to run away from, but has to be understood. If it is understood, it will end there. When we say, “This child doesn’t understand dukkha”, we mean that he is still very ignorant and continues to be naughty. He is going round in the cycle of saMsAra. When the child understands better then he will stop doing naughty things. So understanding dukkha is very important.
What do we need to do with Dukkha Samudaya SaccA, the Second Noble Truth? We have to eradicate the causes of dukkha. We have to understand the symptoms of the illness and eradicate its causes. The eradication is called pahAna. The Third Noble Truth, Dukkha Nirodha SaccA, needs to be achieved or attained. The last one, Magga SaccA, is to practise, which is called bhAvetabba (bhAvanA, noun). In terms of what we have to do, the first is to understand or pariGGAtabba. The second is to eradicate or pahAtabba. The third is to attain or sacchikAtabba and the fourth is to practise or bhAvetabba.
The Twelve Modes of Wisdom
The Buddha’s realisation of the truth (existence) of dukkha or the attainment of this wisdom is known as saccA nana. His realisation of what to do with dukkha or the attainment of this particular wisdom is known as kicca nana. His realisation that He had understood and accomplished the task of understanding is known as kataGAna. So, there are three aspects of wisdom or three kinds of wisdom in the First Truth. People often ask me how you know when you are enlightened. They are so anxious. Look at the third kind of wisdom, which dawns on you naturally - you will realise that you are enlightened, when enlightenment arises.
Similarly with samudaya saccA, the wisdom or knowledge of the truth (existence) that the causes of dukkha exist is known as saccA nana. The knowledge of what to do with the causes of dukkha, i.e. to eradicate it, is known as kicca nana. The knowledge that the work of eradication has been accomplished is known as kataGAna. Again, there are three.
With nirodha saccA also, the wisdom or knowledge of the truth (existence) that there is and end to dukkha is known as saccA nana. This wisdom is important in life because with that knowledge you can be optimistic; you know that there is an end to suffering. The knowledge of what to do to reach the end of dukkha is known as kicca nana. The knowledge that the end of suffering has been reached and the work has been accomplished is known as kataGAna.
The last magga saccA, is the practice or the Path. The knowledge that the Path leading to cessation of dukkha exists is known as saccA nana. The knowledge of what needs to be done, i.e. following the Path, is known as kicca nana. The knowledge that the task has been accomplished, i.e. the Path has been followed to the end, is known as kataGAna.
I once read in the Readers’ Digest the story of a machine that had stopped running and none of the engineers in the factory could repair it. So an outside specialist had to be called. The specialist spent some time looking around the machine and eventually got hold of a hammer and struck the machine with it. He did it once only. Immediately the machine started running. When the specialist handed in his invoice for $200-00, the factory manager thought that it was too much and so asked for a breakdown of his charges. So the specialist replied: “For hitting the machine with the hammer, I charge $1-00. But for knowing where to hit, I charge $199-00”. This indicates how important kicca nana is. The above three types of wisdom on the Four Noble Truths are also known as the Twelve Modes of Wisdom.
This is the dhamma and it exists. But because people are not aware of it, it is just like the machine that is not running. The Buddha was the one who set the machine in motion. The word pavattana means to set in motion. Mind you, He didn’t charge you.
(Translated from Burmese to English by Kyaw Thinn, Birmingham, U.K)
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