The Eightfold Path Week One: Overview, Right View Sutta Readings

The Middle Way The Middle Path realized by the Buddha gives vision, gives knowledge, and leads to calm, to insight, to enlightenment and to Nibbana. And what is that Middle Path? It is the Noble Eightfold path, and nothing else, namely: right view, right intention, right speech, right action, right livelihood, right effort, right mindfulness and right concentration. This is the Middle Path realized by the Buddha which gives vision, which gives knowledge, and leads to calm, to insight, to enlightenment, and to Nibbana. What Is Dukkha? "Now what, friends, is the noble truth of dukkha? Birth is dukkha, aging is dukkha, death is dukkha; sorrow, lamentation, pain, distress, and despair are dukkha; association with the unbeloved is dukkha; separation from the loved is dukkha; not getting what is wanted is dukkha. In short, the five clinging-aggregates are dukkha.” – SN 56.11 Good and Bad Seeds For a person with wrong view, whatever actions, intentions, aspirations or decisions are undertaken according to that view incline toward what is unwelcome, unagreeable, unpleasing, unbeneficial — towards suffering. Just as when a chokeberry seed is planted in moist soil, whatever nutrients it draws from the earth or from the water inclines it towards bitterness, acridity, and disagreeableness. Why is that? Because the seed is bitter. For a person with right view, whatever actions, intentions, aspirations or decisions are undertaken according to that view incline toward what is welcome, agreeable, pleasing, beneficial — towards non-suffering. Just as when a sugarcane seed is planted in moist soil, whatever nutrients it draws from the earth or from the water inclines it towards sweetness, agreeableness, deliciousness. Why is that? Because the seed is sweet. – A 1:17.9–10 Kamma “I am the owner of my actions, heir of my actions; born of my actions, and bound to my actions, and supported by my actions. Whatever deeds I do, good or bad, of that I will become the heir.” – A 5.57 Right View and Kamma “When a noble disciple understands what is kammically unwholesome, and the root of unwholesome kamma, what is kammically wholesome, and the root of wholesome kamma, then he has right view.”

This Week’s Lists and Pali Terms

Four Noble Truths • Understanding suffering, • Its origin or arising, • Its cessation, • Path leading to its cessation

Eightfold Path • Right view • Right intention • Right speech • Right action • Right livelihood • Right effort • Right mindfulness • Right concentration

Three Unwholesome Roots • Greed (attachment, lust) • Aversion (hatred, anger, aggression) • Delusion (ignorance, indifference)

Three Marks of Existence • Unsatisfactoriness (dukkha) • Impermanence (anicca) • Not self (anatta)

Five Aggregates (Skandhas) • Form (rupa: the physical world) • Feeling (vedana: pleasant, unpleasant, neutral) • Perception (sanna) • Mental Formations (sankharas: mental states, emotions, volitions) • Consciousness (vinnana)

Taints (Asavas) • Craving for sense pleasures • Becoming, or craving for existence • Ignorance/not understanding true nature of things • Attachment to opinions, views

Group Reflection

What’s your motivation for taking this course? What do you hope to get out of it? To learn more about Buddhism? To improve your quality of life? To awaken? Something else? Explore these questions together, and wrap up by setting a brief intention for our six weeks together.

Home Reflection and Practice

1. What views do you live by? Tune into the primary views, orientations, or beliefs that inform your life — those that are both obvious and more subtle. How do your views influence your experience? How do they help or hinder?

2. Explore the experience of dukkha in your life. Tune in to the moments when dissatisfaction, stress, and suffering arise. Keep track of them in a journal if you can. At the end of the week, write a one-two sentence summary of your observations and what you learned from the discussion on dukkha in class to share the next time we meet. 3. Optional but highly recommended: Watch The Buddha, a 2-hour PBS documentary