Suffering in Dhamma

 Attached to The Four Noble Truths→

“When, friends, a noble disciple understands suffering, the origin of suffering, the cessation of suffering, and the way leading to the cessation of suffering, in that way he is one of right view, whose view is straight, who has unwavering confidence in the Dhamma and has arrived at this true Dhamma.…and has arrived at this true Dhamma.

“And what is suffering, what is the origin of suffering, what is the cessation of suffering, what is the way leading to the cessation of suffering? Birth is suffering; ageing is suffering; sickness is suffering; death is suffering; sorrow, lamentation, pain, grief, and despair are suffering; not to obtain what one wants is suffering; in short, the five aggregates affected by clinging are suffering. This is called suffering.

“And what is the origin of suffering? It is craving, which brings renewal of being, is accompanied by delight and lust, and delights in this and that; that is, craving for sensual pleasures, craving for being, and craving for non-being. This is called the origin of suffering.

“And what is the cessation of suffering? It is the remainderless fading away and ceasing, the giving up, relinquishing, letting go, and rejecting of that same craving. This is called the cessation of suffering.

“And what is the way leading to the cessation of suffering? It is just this Noble Eightfold Path; that is, right view, right intention, right speech, right action, right livelihood, right effort, right mindfulness, and right concentration.

“When a noble disciple has thus understood suffering, the origin of suffering, the cessation of suffering, and the way leading to the cessation of suffering…he here and now makes an end of suffering. In that way too a noble disciple is one of right view…and has arrived at this true Dhamma.” MN 9

not to obtain what one wants is suffering

“And what, friends, is ‘not to obtain what one wants is suffering’? To beings subject to birth there comes the wish: ‘Oh, that we were not subject to birth! That birth would not come to us!’ But this is not to be obtained by wishing, and not to obtain what one wants is suffering. To beings subject to ageing…subject to sickness…subject to death…subject to sorrow, lamentation, pain, grief, and despair, there comes the wish: ‘Oh, that we were not subject to sorrow, lamentation, pain, grief, and despair! That sorrow, lamentation, pain, grief, and despair would not come to us!’ But this is not to be obtained by wishing, and not to obtain what one wants is suffering.

The five aggregates affected by clinging

And what, friends, are the five aggregates affected by clinging that, in short, are suffering? They are: the material form aggregate affected by clinging, the feeling aggregate affected by clinging, the perception aggregate affected by clinging, the determinations aggregate affected by clinging, and the consciousness aggregate affected by clinging. These are the five aggregates affected by clinging that, in short, are suffering. This is called the noble truth of suffering. MN 141

Synonyms for he five aggregates affected by clinging

These five aggregates affected by clinging are called person (sakkāya) by the Blessed One.
MN 44

And what, bhikkhus, is the burden? It should be said: the five aggregates subject to clinging

“Bhikkhus, I will teach you the burden (bhārādāna), the carrier of the burden, the taking up of the burden, and the laying down of the burden. Listen to that….

“And what, bhikkhus, is the burden? It should be said: the five aggregates subject to clinging. What five? The form aggregate subject to clinging, the feeling aggregate subject to clinging, the perception aggregate subject to clinging, the determinations aggregate subject to clinging, the consciousness aggregate subject to clinging. This is called the burden.

“And what, bhikkhus, is the carrier of the burden? It should be said: the individual, this venerable one of such a name and clan. This is called the carrier of the burden.

“And what, bhikkhus, is the taking up of the burden? It is this craving that leads to renewed existence, accompanied by delight and lust, seeking delight here and there; that is, craving for sensual pleasures, craving for existence, craving for extermination. This is called the taking up of the burden.

“And what, bhikkhus, is the laying down of the burden? It is the remainderless fading away and cessation of that same craving, the giving up and relinquishing of it, freedom from it, non-reliance on it. This is called the laying down of the burden.”

This is what the Blessed One said. Having said this, the Fortunate One, the Teacher, further said this:

“The five aggregates are truly burdens,
The burden-carrier is the individual.
Taking up the burden is suffering in the world,
Laying the burden down is blissful.
Having laid the heavy burden down
Without taking up another burden,
Having drawn out craving with its root,
One is free from hunger, fully quenched.”

SN 22 : 22

Now this has been said by the Blessed One: “One who sees dependent origination sees the Dhamma; one who sees the Dhamma sees dependent origination.” And these five aggregates affected by clinging are dependently arisen. The desire, indulgence, inclination, and holding based on these five aggregates affected by clinging is the origin of suffering. The removal of desire and lust, the abandonment of desire and lust for these five aggregates affected by clinging is the cessation of suffering.’ MN 28

‘In this world, bhikkhus, with its devas, Māra, and Brahmā, among this population with its ascetics and brahmins, its devas and humans, that which is regarded as “This is happiness,” the noble ones have seen well with correct wisdom thus: “This is suffering” ’—this is one contemplation. ‘In this world . . . with its devas and humans, that which is regarded as “This is suffering,” the noble ones have seen well with correct wisdom thus, “This is happiness” ’—this is a second contemplation. When a bhikkhu dwells thus correctly contemplating a dyad—heedful, ardent, and resolute—one of two fruits is to be expected of him: either final knowledge in this very life, or, if there is a residue of clinging, the state of non-returning.”

This is what the Blessed One said. Having said this, the Fortunate One, the Teacher, further said this:

“Forms, sounds, tastes, odors,
textures, and objects of mind—
all are desirable, lovely, agreeable,
so long as it is said: ‘They are.’ 

“These are considered as happiness
in the world with its devas;
but where these cease,
that they consider suffering.

“The noble ones have seen as happiness
the cessation of the person (sakkāya)
Running counter to the entire world
is this [insight] of those who see.

“What others speak of as happiness,
that the noble ones speak of as suffering.
What others speak of as suffering,
that the noble ones have known as happiness.
Behold this Dhamma hard to comprehend:
here the foolish are bewildered.

“There is gloom for those who are blocked,
darkness for those who do not see,
but for the good it is opened up
like light for those who see.
The brutes unskilled in the Dhamma
do not understand it even when close.

“This Dhamma is not easily understood
by those afflicted by lust for being,
by those flowing in the stream of being,
deeply mired in Māra’s realm.

“Who else apart from the noble ones
are able to understand this state?
When they have correctly known that state,
those without influxes attain nibbāna.”

Sutta Nipata 759 - 765

So now we can add another synonyms for suffering since puthujjana's state is that of being (bhava) and the most fundamental aspect of it is the attitude "I am".

[Pleasurable is dispassion in the world,
The getting beyond sensuality.
But the putting away of the conceit ‘I am’
—this is the highest pleasure.
Udāna 11

“Friend Saviṭṭha, apart from faith, apart from personal preference, apart from oral tradition, apart from reasoned reflection, apart from acceptance of a view after pondering it, I know this, I see this: ‘Nibbāna is the cessation of being.’

SN 12 : 68

“If, friend Yamaka, they were to ask you: ‘Friend Yamaka, when a bhikkhu is an arahant, one whose taints are destroyed, what happens to him with the breakup of the body, after death?’—being asked thus, what would you answer?”

“If they were to ask me this, friend, I would answer thus: ‘Friends, form is impermanent; what is impermanent is suffering; what is suffering has ceased and passed away. Feeling … Perception … Determinations… Consciousness is impermanent; what is impermanent is suffering; what is suffering has ceased and passed away.’ Being asked thus, friend, I would answer in such a way.”
“Good, good, friend Yamaka! SN 22: 85

“Friend, though I have clearly seen as it really is with correct wisdom, ‘Nibbāna is the cessation of being,’ I am not an arahant, one whose taints are destroyed. Suppose, friend, there was a well along a desert road, but it had neither a rope nor a bucket. Then a man would come along, oppressed and afflicted by the heat, tired, parched, and thirsty. He would look down into the well and the knowledge would occur to him, ‘There is water,’ but he would not be able to make bodily contact with it. So too, friend, though I have clearly seen as it really is with correct wisdom, ‘Nibbāna is the cessation of being,’ I am not an arahant, one whose taints are destroyed.”
SN 12 : 68

Now, in the simile sekha sees the water in the well. Arahat is one who makes "bodily contact with water"; than puthujjana should be one who doesn't see the well at all, or doesn't know that actually there is water in it.

The puthujjana's state is that of suffering (dukkha), arahat realised the cassation of dukkha. How  should be described -in the terms of dukkha- the state of sekha?

Bhikkhu Bodhi honestly describes himself as puthujjana, and his critique of Van Nanavira Thera confirms it. Here we can read:

An unbiased and complete survey of the Nikāyas, however, would reveal that the problem of dukkha to which the Buddha’ s Teaching is addressed is not primarily existential anxiety, nor even the distorted sense of self of which such anxiety may be symptomatic. The primary problem of dukkha with which the Buddha is concerned, in its most comprehensive and fundamental dimensions, is the problem of our bondage to samsāra—the round of repeated birth, aging, and death.

But if "distorted sense of self" means something, it must mean attavada, and inseparable from it sakkayaditthi. But this precisely dukkha, or suffering not recognised by puthujjana as suffering, and this is precisely what constitute difference between puthujjana:

“This world, Kaccāna, is for the most part shackled by engagement, clinging, and adherence. But this one [with right view] does not become engaged and cling through that engagement and clinging, mental standpoint, adherence, underlying tendency; he does not take a stand about ‘my self.’ He has no perplexity or doubt that what arises is only suffering arising, what ceases is only suffering ceasing. His knowledge about this is independent of others. It is in this way, Kaccāna, that there is right view. SN 12:15

So in terms of dukkha- sekha has abandoned or understood dukkha connected with attavada, and precisely this gives him direct knowledge that the attitude "I am" is dukkha or suffering which should be understood and abandon. And he sees the path leading to the cessation of the conceit "I am". Puthujjana, being the victim of upādanā (with upādanā as condition, bhava) is imprisoned in dialect being - not being.

Does sekha, being alone, and reflecting on his own experience think: "I am a sekha"? Very unlikely. Anyway, most certainly he should not think this way. Such statement is justified when two individuals (puggala) are communicating with each other, and definitely there's certain state which Lord Buddha classified as "sekha experience". But since there is direct knowledge that the attitude "I am" is suffering, the phrase: "I am sekha" is quite ambiguous and it may mean just another way of falling into sakkāyadiṭṭhi, simply another way of affirmation of ones own being, without actually seeing the escape from it.

"Simply" on the verbal level, existentially puthujjana who sees himself as ariya is in the worse situation than common puthujjana, whose self-image is less unrealistic. Average puthujjana (practicing Dhamma) at least knows that he doesn't know, so he tries to understand Dhamma, while if you do not know that you do not know, you do not even want to know.

Another way of describing experience, apart aggregates, is by sense bases. But principle is the same, dukkha or suffering is connected with not knowing and not understanding impermanence. This allows puthujjana to see the eye as "mine" or "self".

“Bhikkhus, the eye is impermanent. What is impermanent is suffering. What is suffering is nonself. What is nonself should be seen as it really is with correct wisdom thus: ‘This is not mine, this I am not, this is not my self.’

“The ear is impermanent…. The nose is impermanent…. The tongue is impermanent…. The body is impermanent…. The mind is impermanent. What is impermanent is suffering. What is suffering is nonself. What is nonself should be seen as it really is with correct wisdom thus: ‘This is not mine, this I am not, this is not my self.’

“Seeing thus, bhikkhus, the instructed noble experiences estrangement towards the eye, estrangement towards the ear, estrangement towards the nose, estrangement towards the tongue, estrangement towards the body, estrangement towards the mind. Experiencing estrangement, he becomes dispassionate. Through dispassion [his mind] is liberated. When it is liberated there comes the knowledge: ‘It’s liberated.’ He understands: ‘Destroyed is birth, the holy life has been lived, what had to be done has been done, there is no more for this state of being.’”
SN 35 : 1

“Bhikkhus, one who seeks delight in the eye seeks delight in suffering. One who seeks delight in suffering, I say, is not freed from suffering. One who seeks delight in the ear … in the nose … in the tongue … in the body … in the mind seeks delight in suffering. One who seeks delight in suffering, I say, is not freed from suffering.

“One who does not seek delight in the eye … in the mind does not seek delight in suffering. One who does not seek delight in suffering, I say, is freed from suffering.” SN 35: 19

The delight (nandi) Suttas define as upādāna (in this translation "clinging")

“Bhikkhus, the arising, continuation, production, and manifestation of the eye is the arising of suffering, the continuation of disease, the manifestation of aging-and-death. The arising of the ear … the nose … the tongue … the body … the mind is the arising of suffering, the continuation of disease, the manifestation of aging-and-death.

“The cessation, subsiding, and passing away of the eye … the mind is the cessation of suffering, the subsiding of disease, the passing away of aging-and-death.” SN 35: 21

The article obviously doesn't cover all aspects of suffering, the emphasis was put on suffering connected with being (bhava) and self-identification which supports the attitude "I am".

The DN 1 discusses self-identification or ignorance on reflective level, while MN1 emphasises conceiving, so it is rather addressed to sekha. One who is imprisoned in brahmajala (D 1) first must abandon suffering in the form of sakkāyadiṭṭhi.

Arahat realised the cessation of suffering. It is the sekha who should train himself in not conceiving, including conceiving "I am a sekha". Sounds strange? Let's repeat. Suttas recognise 9 puggalas. 8 ariyas + puthujjana.

Arahat is a puggala, "who" realised nibbana, the cessation of bhava (being), here and now. "Who" is put in quote marks since with the cessation of person (sakkāya) there is nobody there to afirm "I am". But when the individual -puggala- truthfully known as sekha doesn't has to communicate verbally with other individuals, direct (non-verbal) knowledge that the attitude "I am" is dukkha remains. So it is absolutely unnecessary to asert it verbally  or by thinking. Contrary, while arahat can safely use such terms as "I", "mine", "I am",  sekha, (not being free from conceiving in this terms), sees that the way leading to the cessation of "I am" includes any kind of self-image. In other words, he sees that while arahat as a puggala is definitely superior to less advanced puggalas, idea "I am superior" doesn't arise in the arahat's mind.

Nisargadatta Maharaj: I am free of memories and anticipations, unconcerned with what I am and what I am not. I am not addicted to self-descriptions, soham and brahmasmi ('I am He', 'I am the Supreme') are of no use to me, I have the courage to be as nothing and to see the world as it is: nothing. It sounds simple, just try it!
Q: But what gives you courage?
M: How perverted are your views! Need courage be given? Your question implies that anxiety is the normal state and courage is abnormal. It is the other way round. Anxiety and hope are born of imagination — I am free of both. I am simple being and I need nothing to rest on.

Nanavira Thera: The Mūlapariyāyasutta is as follows. (i) The puthujjana ‘perceives X as X; perceiving X as X, he conceives X, he conceives In X, he conceives From X, he conceives “X is mine”; he delights in X…’. (ii) The sekha ‘recognizes X as X; recognizing X as X, he should not conceive X, he should not conceive In X, he should not conceive From X, he should not conceive “X is mine”; he should not delight in X…’. (iii) The arahat ‘recognizes X as X; recognizing X as X, he does not conceive X, he does not conceive In X, he does not con-ceive From X, he does not conceive “X is mine”; he does not delight in X…’.

This tetrad of maññanā, of ‘conceivings’, represents four progressive levels of explicitness in the basic structure of appropriation. The first, ‘he conceives X’, is so subtle that the appropriation is simply implicit in the verb.

Taking advantage of an extension of meaning (not, however, found in the Pali maññati), we can re-state ‘he conceives X’ as ‘X conceives’, and then understand this as ‘X is pregnant’—pregnant, that is to say, with subjectivity .

And, just as when a woman first conceives she has nothing to show for it, so at this most implicit level we can still only say ‘X’; but as the pregnancy advances, and it begins to be noticeable, we are obliged to say ‘In X’; then the third stage of the pregnancy, when we begin to suspect that a separation is eventually going to take place, can be described as ‘From X’; and the fourth stage, when the infant’s head makes a public appearance and the separation is on the point of becoming definite, is the explicit ‘X is mine (me, not mama)’. This separation is first actually realized in asmimāna, where I, as subject, am opposed to X, as object; and when the subject eventually grows up he becomes the ‘self’ of attavāda, face to face with the ‘world’ in which he exists. (In spite of the simile, what is described here is a single graded structure all implicated in the present, and not a development taking place in time. When there is attavāda, the rest of this edifice lies beneath it: thus attavāda requires asmimāna (and the rest), but there can be asmimāna without attavāda*.) Note that it is only the sekha who has the ethical imperative ‘should not’: the puthujjana, not ‘recognizing X as X’ (he perceives X as X, but not as impermanent), does not see for himself that he should not conceive X; while the arahat, though ‘recognizing X as X’, no longer conceives X.

* This is the core of Nisargadatta Maharaj teaching, for now, puthujjana should not worry much about abandoning ignorance on pre-reflective level, but try to "purify" it from "I am this or that".

NM Coming back to the idea of having been born. You are stuck with what your parents told you: all about conception, pregnancy and birth, infant, child, youngster, teenager, and so on. Now, divest yourself of the idea that you are the body with the help of the contrary idea that you are not the body. It is also an idea, no doubt; treat it like something to be abandoned when its work is done.

Summarize, being someone is the state of suffering, being nobody is the greatest happiness. It can be achieved by someone who is ready to abandon any kind of self-descriptions, even if on certain level they are valid. Who doesn't see the way leading to being nobody, and thinks about himself "I am ariya", is just the victim of sakkāyadiṭṭhi. His self-image is no doubt quite gratifying, but ...

Nanavira Thera: ... anyone who thinks ‘When shall I become an arahat?’ is ipso facto failing to understand what it means to be an arahat (since being an arahat means not thinking in terms of ‘I’).