ASR100 Lecture Notes - Lecture 4: Middle Way, Hinayana, Bodhi
Deakin University ASR100 World Religions Trimester Two 2017
Week Four: Buddhism I – History, Beliefs and Practices
Life of the Buddha
• Siddhhata Gotama, The Buddha (awakened one, or one who has woken up)
• The 4 sights: old age, sickness, death, a wandering ascetic
• The renunciation: left his life as price, wife, child to seek awakening (for benefit of all sentient
beingd)
"For countless ages I have enjoyed sensual objects of sight, sound, colour, flavour, and touch, in
all their varieties: but they have not made me happy"
• Realizing this, I will embark on the raft of dharma, which is steadfast,
• Endowed with the range of austerities, good conduct, equanimity, effort, strength, and
generosity,
Pali
Sanskrit
dhamma*
dharma
Way, teaching, truth, reality
kamma*
karma
Moral action, intentional
action
dukkha
duhkha
Suffering, dissatisfaction
khandhas
skandhas
Aggregates – the five
elements that make up a
person
anatta
anatman
No-self
anicca
anitya
Impermanence (not
constant)
paticca-
samuppada
pratitya-
samutpada
Dependent origination
nibbana
nirvana
Enlightenment
arahant
arhat
One who has achieved full
awakening (“worthy one”)
bodhisatta
bodhisattva
One on their way to
Buddhahood
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Deakin University ASR100 World Religions Trimester Two 2017
• The quest: meditation, asceticism with wandering sadhus [ascetics]
• But dissatisfied ith this, eds up lettig go of reuiatio itself
• The great enlightenment under the bodhi (awakening) tree at Bodh-Gaya: one night of intense
effort, wakes to understand the essential nature of the world (the 4 noble truths), and to
realise that the ego is a fiction
• Ke isight: hua life is ostatl hagig ad fraught ith sufferig… life is dukkha
Four Noble Truths
1. Dukkha
Life is Dukkha (suffering, that which is hard to bear) essentially unsatifactory:
o Obvious suffering eg. Illness, grief
o The changeable and impermanent world (happiness never lasts, even pleasant
experiences are problematic
o The conditioned nature of human experience (everything is conditioned
2. Samudaya
Refers to the origin or cause of suffering:
o Tanha (grasping, thirst), self-seekig ish to fulfilet. Iludes ego-graspig
o Avidya (lack of awareness), false attribution of independence about oneself and others,
leads to ego-grasping
Desires lead to attachment, and attachment is the root of suffering (non attachment is key
Buddhist virtue)
3. Nirodha
o The extinction or cessation of suffering is possible
o If we eliminate tanha then the problematic and unsatisfactory nature of human existence
can be overcome: there is a way out of dukkha
o The cure is to overcome the craving
4. Magga
o The path to the essatio of sufferig is to follo the Middle Wa, or the Nole Eightfold
Path
o Outlines the right ways to conduct oneself so as to draw closer to nibbana – a strategy or
method
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