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You can read (and download) the following chapters as PDF's
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Read Victor Byrd's On-Line Book
INTRODUCTION We sit on the cushion and aspire to improve, which is to say that we want to gain more peace and insight into ourselves, but we don’t really believe that we have within our own minds the capacity for complete and radical change. How many of us sit to end all delusion, to find the ultimate goal that the Buddha literally guaranteed to each of us as our birthright: the unshakable deliverance of the heart? (new) CHAPTER ONE -- THE FIRST NOBLE TRUTH We are going to study what is perhaps the most complete blueprint for building a spiritual laboratory ever recorded in human history. It is called the Eightfold Path, and it is a major theme of the extraordinary dharma symphony heard by the Buddha that sacred night of his illumination. The blueprint of the Eightfold Path is so comprehensive that it does not require you to be a Buddhist: It allows you to be a Jew, a Christian, or an atheist. It speaks not only to the progeny of those people in India who sat near the Buddha, basking in the light of his truth; it also speaks across the ages to a Western culture that has developed in a profoundly different psychological direction. The Buddha’s first insight is what he called the Noble Truth of Dukkha, or the Noble Truth of Suffering. Dukkha is also translated as “dissatisfaction” by many teachers, “pain” by others, and some translate this Pali word as “anxiety.” The truth of the Buddha-dharma begins with a shattering insight: Suffering is as familiar to us as our heart beat. The Buddha places this truth of dukkha in front of us like an enormous boulder, and not for a moment does he try to couch his message in soft lights. This affair is a matter of life and death. (new) CHAPTER TWO -- THE SECOND NOBLE TRUTH The Buddha’s first insight was his complete opening to the reality of suffering. He saw with the clear vision-eye of Dharma that suffering is not caused by some aberration of birth or circumstances. It is not caused by bad karma, nor is it something from which we can escape if we just play our cards carefully. Dukkha is hard-wired into our brains. The Buddha’s followers called this the First Noble Truth. After this first insight, he looked into the cause of suffering. We suffer because we desire - pure and simple. This became known as the Buddha’s Second Noble Truth. (new) CHAPTER THREE -- THE MONK AND THE PSYCHOLOGIST Theravada Buddhism elegantly lays out the progressive stages of Insight that each meditator must experience on her journey from the unreal to the Real. It is a fascinating blueprint of mental development, leading to a pivotal moment in the process of transformation: The mind begins to see. What an anticlimactic sentence! The mind begins to see Truth – things as they really are. It sees what it has relentlessly denied for so long: Every experience is impermanent; every experience occurs without a “me” in it; and every experience is ultimately unsatisfactory. (new) THE THIRD NOBLE TRUTH - THE END OF SUFFERING No one saves us, but ourselves. To read the rest of this chapter, please click the PDF: THE FOURTH NOBLE TRUTH - THE EIGHTFOLD PATH: The Eightfold Path is the Buddha’s blueprint for building a spiritual laboratory, and as Rajneesh reminds us, the laboratory we are building is ourselves. It is not a place that we can drive to every morning, and leave when our work is done for the day. Nor is it a church, cathedral, temple or synagogue where we go for spiritual nourishment once a week, although those can be places where we do reconnect to the spiritual. We are the spiritual laboratory, the holy ground is where we stand, and, in the process of construction, we become the experiment itself.
What the Illumined One saw in the Twelve Nidanas was a mechanistic (not human) process that controls every living form, from an amoeba to Mozart. It is a shattering vision of humans who live like robots trapped within a matrix. We dream that we are awake, but the dream is only a delusion, and as we will shortly see, this core delusion covers consciousness as completely as a thick fog blocks out the sun’s bright rays on a gray misty morning.
Understanding avijja can be a tremendous relief to someone (like myself) who thinks that Buddhist insight depends on “being smart.” Intellect is not worth a dime in the realm of truth, but an insight into what avijja really is, can profoundly open the heart of your understanding.
THE FOURTH NOBLE TRUTH - THE EIGHTFOLD PATH - RIGHT UNDERSTANDING - NIDANAS #2 to #8 Let’s review tanha’s lineage. From the “I am” sense of vinnana, which was already dipped in the dark well of avijja and shaped by the karma formation of sankhara, came this mind-body combination called nama-rupa. The mind-body developed the six sense doors (salayatana) and a capacity to make contact with the environment (phassa). Contact elicited thousands of feelings (vedana), a veritable thicket of feelings. And we got lost in that thicket. Each path we took (greed, hatred, and delusion) led us to where we now stand, at the eighth nidana of craving. In the absence of awareness, this is one hell of a mess! THE FOURTH NOBLE TRUTH - THE EIGHTFOLD PATH - RIGHT UNDERSTANDING - NIDANAS #9 to #12 The law of anicca teaches us that all composites (things made up of separate parts) are impermanent. For instance, “car” describes a composite of doors, windows, wheels, an engine, etc. Those parts combine to create something called “car.” The human body is made up of legs, arms, heart, lungs, brain, etc., but each of these parts, containing millions of cells, are also composites. Even the cells are composites. It goes on and on. Like a car, this vehicle called “body” is subject to the law of anicca and according to the Buddha, all composites will eventually crumble and fall apart. {This chapter also includes the Five Skandhas.}
THE FOURTH NOBLE TRUTH - THE EIGHTFOLD PATH - RIGHT THOUGHT THE FOURTH NOBLE TRUTH - THE EIGHTFOLD PATH - RIGHT SPEECH It makes perfect sense that the Buddha made Right Speech the third step of the Eightfold Path. It is the next step in an outward movement that takes us away from ourselves. If wrong speech is the main exit off the mindfulness highway, right speech keeps us on the road. Impeccable (right) speech is a brilliant way to practice mindfulness. THE FOURTH NOBLE TRUTH - THE EIGHTFOLD PATH - RIGHT ACTION & RIGHT LIVELIHOOD The foundation of Right Action and Right Livelihood sits upon the ancient ground of ahimsa, the Dharma of nonviolence. Do no harm. Ahimsa is like a touchstone. Rubbing against its fine grain reveals the gold within. Every question that we have about Right Action or Right Livelihood, at least from the Buddhist perspective, must be rubbed against ahimsa. This is not to say that a deep commitment to ahimsa will provide us with simple answers to extraordinary situations, but at least we will find ourselves pointed in the right direction. THE FOURTH NOBLE TRUTH - THE EIGHTFOLD PATH - RIGHT EFFORT As we study the Eightfold Path, we must continually remember that we are learning a new language. Thus we begin with an attitude of humility. Instead of skipping over difficult concepts such as non-duality, anatta, anicca, dukkha or the twelve nidanas, we must work with our resistance. We must admit that our Right Understanding is only skin deep and that these truths have yet to flower and whisper their secrets to us. Thank goodness we are enduring. Now it is time to learn the language!
THE FOURTH NOBLE TRUTH - THE EIGHTFOLD PATH - The Buddha’s message of freedom from suffering is “Tough Love,” pure and simple. In the seventh step of the Eightfold Path, Right Sati, he gets down to business, to the basic techniques that we need in order to move out of the content and into the process of living. THE FOURTH NOBLE TRUTH - THE EIGHTFOLD PATH - CONCLUSION Life seems to fly by at an increasingly frenetic pace as we enter the twenty-first century. We careen through the obstacle course of our busy lives and grab whatever synopsis is available to help us “bottom line” difficult or dense material. But there is no short cut to listening to a Mozart Symphony and there are no quick and easy “Buddhist Cliff Notes” that will open us to the essence of the Buddha-dharma. One can stand back and admire a beautiful flower, but there is only one way to experience its subtle fragrance: up close and personal. Either we dedicate our time and attention to the Buddha-dharma, with an open mind and tender heart, or we do not.
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