Siddhartha Gautama was born around 566 B.C.E. (Some sources differ on the exact date.) into the family of King Shuddhodana and Queen Maya near Kapilavastu, on the Himalayas’ lower slopes. He was destined for great things, and his father sheltered him from harshness of peasant life. Siddhartha was raised in luxury, as a prince, and was married and had a child. However, in his thirties, he ventured outside the palace and saw four sights which changed his life. He saw a sick person, an old person, a corpse, and an ascetic. This inspired him to renounce his life in the palace and find his own way in the world. He left his home. There is a story about how his father tracked him down one day and found him in rags, living as an ascetic. His father asked him why he chose to live that way, and Siddhartha replied that it was the way of his kind.

Siddhartha experimented with life as an ascetic and as a hedonist but decided neither path was right for authentic happiness. He adopted what he called a Middle Path between the extremes of self-denial and self-indulgence.

One day, Siddhartha sat beneath a Bodhi tree and meditated. Here, he experienced an awakening, an enlightenment. For the remaining forty-five years of his life, he wandered from town to town and spoke of his visions. From this, he became known as the Buddha, the enlightened one.

What Siddhartha formalized for himself, that time under the Bodhi tree, was what he called the Four Noble Truths:

1. Life is suffering.

2. The cause of suffering is craving.

3. One can end suffering by ending craving.

4. The way to end craving is found in the Eightfold Path.

The Eightfold Path consists of:

1. Right thought, which means right outlook or understanding of the Four Noble Truths.

2. Right resolve, which means having a purpose to reach salvation.

3. Right speech, not to lie and not to slander.

4. Right behavior, not to kill, steal, be unchaste, or drink intoxicants.

5. Right self-discipline, to practice the monastic life.

6. Right effort, to exercise will power.

7. Right mindfulness, to have self-knowledge and constantly check it.

8. Right self-transcendence, to meditate on ultimate truths.

When Siddhartha died peacefully in 483 B.C.E., he is said to have finally found nirvana, a way out of the cycle of reincarnation. He found it earlier also when he became aware of how to overcome the cravings and be at peace.

Buddha, Siddhartha Gautama, was a real person, not a god. Buddhism is not a theistic belief system. It is atheistic. It is a rebellion from the Vedic based religions of the Hindus, but it does have some of the same images.

The idea of life as suffering caused by craving is tied to the view that all reality is in constant flux, impermanent, constantly changing. Even people are constantly changing, in process, but they try to hang onto something permanent. In Hinduism, this constant changing is even part of the constant cause and effect that is associated with karma and reincarnation. But reincarnation is not always seen as something positive. When a person can escape that and just sink into oblivion, it is considered blissful, freedom from goal seeking and attachment to elusive permanence, nirvana.

In western philosophy, this constant changing is identified in Heraclites, who compared reality to fire, something in constant flux. He used another metaphor when he said one cannot step twice into the same river.

Whitehead, Sartre, and others also subscribe to this constant flux idea. It is opposed to the ideas of Parmenides, Plato, Aristotle, and others who think there is a permanent essence or nature which can be identified. Plato and Aristotle try to combine this impermanence and permanence, like Kant tried to combine empiricism and rationalism. NickOtani’sNeo-Objectivism also tries to point out freedom within set parameters, which is another way of combining flux and permanence. However, it is a dualism which many eastern religions and monism escape. Spinoza escapes it. Sartre escapes it, and Buddha escapes it.

Yes, Buddhism escapes dualism but may have other problems. The flux of Buddhism leads to an idea of no-self, that the idea of individualism is just an illusion. Hume says this also, when he describes how he searches his consciousness for a self which he can’t find. If everything is impermanent, like fire or a river, then there can be no essence, no permanent nature, no individual, no self. However, we keep trying to think of ourselves as individuals. This is how we crave and make ourselves miserable. We see this when we get what we want and then don’t want it anymore and want other things. Our materialism doesn’t keep us happy. If we stop thinking of ourselves as individuals separate from that which we want, then we can be free, unattached to external forces that can control us, as Marx said we are controlled by capitol.

The constant flux of Sartre’s existentialism is positive. It is a process of becoming. Yes, it does not recognize a pre-existing essence, but it allows for humans, the things for themselves, to work on their own natures, to become something. Buddhism seems to want the opposite, to become nothing. Rather than facing life and overcoming challenges, really being involved in life, Buddhism seems to withdraw from life.

Some of us have read this little book by Herman Hesse, Siddhartha. It is still a very good book which gives us an idea of Buddhism and how it relates to Hindu religions. After this Siddhartha’s son gets frustrated with Siddhartha, he leaves and makes Siddhartha, the father, very sad. The sad father then goes down to the river and seeks solitude. He tells his problems to the river, and the river just flows and seems to laugh. It symbolizes all the people in reality who have goals and disappointments which are all swept away, never remaining permanent, all mixing together and being carried out to sea. This gives Siddhartha some perspective. He is no more important than anything else in all reality. He is just one with everything. And, when he accepts this, he is free, beyond the kind of individual who can be hurt.

I think there is a little nihilism in all that. Perhaps it is a way of dealing with emotional wounds, and I can empathize. My own wife and son left me, and it hurts. I would like to find some way to escape that pain. However, it doesn’t work for me. Some prisoners go to jail and try to practice this denial of self to overcome the pain of being confined, but it only works to a certain extent, unless someone becomes truly detached, and then we say they lose their minds.

I still think there is some essence of humanness which remains the same from location to location and time to time, and it is this which allows us to define humans and human rights. I think we do have freedom within those parameters. This is the freedom of which Sartre speaks, which comes from the process of becoming. And I think we should become meaningful individuals within the parameters of not violating the rights of others to do the same. So, I have to disagree with Buddhism, which says right purpose is to become nothing. I can’t see a pure, classical Buddhist standing up against oppression and fighting for freedom. He would learn to cope with the discomfort of oppression until it doesn’t hurt him anymore, even though I have heard of Buddhists doing just that, taking stands and fighting for justice.

If I am wrong, please let me know. I realize lots of people out there really like Buddhism and may want to debate with me about these problems I see. I’m willing to learn, but I won’t let go of my observations easily. I will if someone can show me where I am wrong.

Bis bald,

Nick