{"id":58,"date":"2020-11-02T14:58:20","date_gmt":"2020-11-02T14:58:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/meditationkent\/?page_id=58"},"modified":"2025-12-07T14:18:07","modified_gmt":"2025-12-07T14:18:07","slug":"buddhism","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/meditationkent\/buddhism\/","title":{"rendered":"What is Buddhism?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Buddhism is a way of life and a way of thinking, based on the teaching of the\u00a0Buddha\u00a0(the Enlightened One), known as the\u00a0Dhamma\u00a0or\u00a0Dharma. \u00a0 It is the way that leads from the suffering and stress that we experience in life, to the freedom and peace of mind known as Nirvana.<\/strong>
\n\u200b
\nThe Buddha taught for many years following his enlightenment some 2,500 years ago. \u00a0 A huge amount of his teaching has been preserved in the Pali language, and is still taught by the monastic tradition he established, the Sangha. \u00a0 Many different traditions have evolved in different countries, but all authentic Buddhist traditions are founded on the original teachings. \u00a0 Nowadays the term Sangha is often used more broadly, to mean Buddhist monastics or clergy of all traditions, or even the whole Buddhist community.<\/p>\n

The Buddha\u2019s enlightenment arose from his experience of what we might call the spiritual dimension, and how this transcends the many forms of unhappiness we experience in life. \u00a0 But in contrast with most religions, his teaching is based firmly on what we experience ourselves, in the natural world. \u00a0 While he made many references to people\u2019s ideas of spiritual beings and heavenly realms, his teaching is not about these things. \u00a0 Nirvana is not Heaven, in the Buddha\u2019s teaching this can be experienced in our own lives.<\/p>\n

The central teaching concerns the nature of happiness and unhappiness, known as the\u00a0Four Noble Truths<\/strong>: \u00a0 The Nature of Suffering, The Cause of Suffering, The End of Suffering, and The Way to End Suffering.<\/p>\n

The Nature of Suffering<\/h3>\n

in the Buddha\u2019s teaching is that life is impermanent, bound up with suffering, and subject to change. \u00a0 This is known as the Three Signs of Being:\u00a0 Impermanence, Suffering (unhappiness or dissatisfaction), and Non-self. \u00a0 These three characteristics of existence in the world are inter-connected within our experience of suffering.<\/p>\n

Non-self is a key aspect of the Buddha\u2019s insight:\u00a0 the understanding that life is a process of change; that everything we think of as our \u201cself\u201d is impermanent, bound up with suffering, and subject to change; the idea of a permanent, independent self is an illusion;\u00a0 and everything else in the world is subject to the three signs of being.\u00a0 \u00a0 In the Buddha\u2019s teaching, the only thing that does not change and does not pass away is the state of freedom and peace of mind called Nirvana.<\/p>\n

From birth to death we change from moment to moment, according to the causes and conditions that have affected us up to then: \u00a0 in Buddhist teaching it is called Conditioned Existence. At any one moment, we are exactly what we have to be, resulting from everything that has happened up to that moment.\u00a0Then, whatever happens at that moment, and how we react to it conditions what we become in the next moment. \u00a0 The Buddhist path focuses on this crucial point, and on developing mindfulness or “present moment awareness.” \u00a0This helps us to respond in the actual moment with wholesome thought and action, which leads to happiness, and refrain from unwholesome thought and action which leads to suffering.<\/p>\n

The Cause of Suffering<\/h3>\n

is selfish craving:\u00a0 grasping at what we like, repelling what we dislike, and attaching to ideas about our self or identity. \u00a0 The Buddha called these three aspects of self-centredness Greed, Hatred and Delusion, the Three Evil Roots, or the Three Fires.<\/p>\n

The End of Suffering<\/h3>\n

is the destruction of selfish craving. \u00a0 With the extinction of the Three Fires, the freedom and peacefulness of Nirvana is experienced.<\/p>\n

The Buddhist path leads us gradually towards Nirvana, and turns our attention outwards from ourselves so that we live more in what the Buddha called the Heavenly Dwellings:\u00a0 Loving Kindness, Compassion, Sympathetic Joy, and Equanimity.\u00a0 \u00a0 The first three qualities are the free and natural sharing in life as it happens around us, in other living beings and in the whole natural world. \u00a0 This open-heartedness is balanced by the further essential quality of equanimity (evenness or serenity), which is a particular emphasis of Buddhist practice.<\/p>\n

The Way to the End of Suffering<\/h3>\n

is the Buddha’s\u00a0Noble Eightfold Path,\u00a0<\/strong>a system of training in higher conduct, heart and mind, and wisdom.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0Higher conduct<\/strong> includes right speech, right action, and right livelihood, which support the training of heart and mind.\u00a0\u00a0 Training the heart and mind\u00a0<\/strong>includes right effort, right mindfulness and right concentration.\u00a0\u00a0 It is the focus of meditation practice, and supports the development of wisdom.\u00a0\u00a0 Wisdom<\/strong> combines right understanding and right intention, and motivates all the steps of the path.\u00a0\u00a0 All eight steps are to be taken together, the Buddhist way of life and thinking.<\/p>\n

More about Buddhism<\/h3>\n

Please click on the links for more about the Buddha\u2019s teaching.<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. An outline of the Buddha\u2019s teaching, and a diagram of Buddhism by Numbers<\/a><\/li>\n
  2. The original teaching on Mindfulness of Breathing<\/a><\/li>\n
  3. and on the Four Foundations of Mindfulness<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    Buddhism is a way of life and a way of thinking, based on the teaching of the\u00a0Buddha\u00a0(the Enlightened One), known as the\u00a0Dhamma\u00a0or\u00a0Dharma. \u00a0 It is … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":18,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/meditationkent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/58"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/meditationkent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/meditationkent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/meditationkent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/18"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/meditationkent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=58"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/meditationkent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/58\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":371,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/meditationkent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/58\/revisions\/371"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/meditationkent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=58"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}