introduction

The Fire Escape

The Buddha’s teachings are like the instructions posted on a hotel room door, telling you what to do when the hotel’s on fire:

This analogy, of course, is far from perfect. After all, in the actual practice of the Buddha’s teachings, the fire is already constantly burning inside your own mind—in the form of the fires of passion, aversion, delusion, and suffering—and the escape from these fires lies, not in leaving your mind, but in going deeper into the mind to a dimension, nibbāna, where fire can’t reach. Also, because both the fire and the escape lie within you, you can’t pull other people to safety. The most you can do for them is to tell or show them the way to practice, which they will have to manage for themselves.

But still, the above analogy is useful for highlighting a number of important features of the Buddha’s practice.

To begin with, the practice is essentially a practice, and not a theory to be idly discussed. Even the theoretical or philosophical aspects of the Buddha’s teachings are there to be used as tools in aiding in the escape from all suffering and stress. It’s because of this fact that the Buddha’s primary metaphor for his teachings was a path: the noble eightfold path, composed of all the “right” factors mentioned above. It’s also why right view, the theory behind the path, is part of the path, and doesn’t stand outside it.

Also, because right view serves as a guide to action, it doesn’t present a full picture of reality, just as a fire-escape map posted on a hotel door doesn’t give complete information about the construction of the hotel. If it did, you’d have trouble figuring out which parts of the map would be useful in the event of a fire. That, in turn, would actually prevent you from making a quick escape. It’s for this reason that right view leaves unanswered many questions about the cosmos and the self, and directs your attention to what needs to be done to escape from the ravages of suffering.

At the same time, right view labels some attitudes about suffering and its end as definitely wrong, just as certain wrong attitudes about fires and escapes would leave you trapped in a burning hotel. Suppose, for instance, that you found messages posted on the hotel room door saying that, in the case of a fire, there is no escape, or that you should wait in your room until a heavenly being saved you, that the fire won’t burn you if you accept and embrace it, or maybe fire isn’t really fire. You’d be wise to distrust those messages, even if they were signed by the hotel management. In the same way, if you’re heedful of the dangers of the fires of the mind, you’d be wise not to fall for messages—even within the Buddhist tradition—that are at odds with the message that it is possible to escape from the suffering that the mind creates for itself, that you can reach this escape through your own efforts, and that it’s the most worthwhile thing you can do in life.

Unfortunately, we live in a time when, in the Buddha’s words, the concept of True Dhamma has disappeared (SN 16:13). This doesn’t mean that the True Dhamma—i.e., a Dhamma teaching a genuine escape from the fires of the mind—isn’t available, simply that so many mutually exclusive versions of the Dhamma have arisen over the centuries, each claiming to be true, that it’s impossible to point to any one version of the Dhamma that everyone will agree to be true. Still, there is only one version of the Dhamma that is fully in accordance with the principle that the fires of suffering are real, that escape from them is possible, and that you can achieve this escape for yourself. That’s the version available in the suttas—discourses—of the Pāli Canon, along with whatever teachings are in accordance with the suttas.

Here again, though, there are many disagreements on what the suttas say, largely because very few people have read them carefully and understood their idiom. This is why I have collected this anthology of passages dealing with the factors of the noble eightfold path, drawn from the suttas and Vinaya—disciplinary rules—of the Pāli Canon, so that you can read the Canon’s teachings on these topics for yourself. I have also provided introductions to the readings as an aid in comprehending the idiom in which the suttas are written, so that you can enter into the mindset of the compilers of the suttas and gain an intuitive feel for what they’re getting at.

The title of this book, On the Path, can be taken in two ways, and both ways are relevant here: (1) This book is about the path and (2) it’s for people who would like to be on the path to the end of suffering. These two aspects of the book correspond to the Buddha’s teaching that there are two sources for the arising of right view: the voice of another and appropriate attention. The voice of another—and this would include written as well as spoken words—is the external source. Appropriate attention—your ability to frame your questions about the path in terms that apply specifically to solve the problem of suffering and stress, and not to any other purpose—is the internal source.

As the reader of this book, you have to supply the internal source if you’re to get the most out of it. As the compiler, I’ve tried to be as faithful as possible in selecting and translating the passages so that they’ll be of most use as the “voice of another.” At the same time, because I am assuming appropriate attention on your part, I have focused the introductory material on practical issues, and have avoided the many academic controversies that have accreted on the topic of the noble eightfold path over the centuries.

Still, not all the controversies about the factors of the path are purely academic. Some have a practical bearing, and there is no getting around the need to take positions on them in your practice of the path. Although I have, by and large, avoided getting involved in polemics in the introductions to the various chapters, I would like to state at the outset the positions I have taken with regard to these practical controversies, based both on my training and on what I have found in the suttas. Some of these positions may appear to belabor the obvious, but many popular interpretations have lost sight of the obvious, so it’s necessary to reaffirm that those obvious points are true.

First, with regard to the path as a whole:

• The path is a path. In other words, (1) it’s not the goal and (2) it’s not meant to lead to any of its own factors. Instead, it’s meant to lead someplace beyond the path. Although some interpreters have stated that the path leads to right view or right mindfulness, in actuality—when we regard these factors in terms of the famous raft analogy (§§13–14)—they are part of the raft, and not the shore that we’re using the raft to reach. And once we reach the shore, we don’t pick up the twigs and branches of right view and right mindfulness to carry them on our head.

• The path is an eightfold path. In other words, all eight factors of the path are necessary for it to yield its intended results. This observation applies specifically to the factor of right concentration. There are interpreters who maintain that the Buddha actually taught two alternative paths—a sixfold path, which includes right mindfulness but not right effort and right concentration—and a sevenfold path, which includes right effort and right concentration but not right mindfulness. This interpretation is based on a definition of right mindfulness that is totally separate from and at odds with right effort and right concentration, but this definition has no basis in the suttas, and can be forced on the suttas only by squeezing them out of shape. As we will see, the suttas actually teach right concentration in a way that includes right mindfulness, and right mindfulness in a way that includes right effort. In this way, the factors of the path are mutually penetrating and mutually reinforcing. In fact, they cannot complete their work unless all eight factors mature together.

• The path is a noble path. In the Buddha’s terms, this means that it leads to a goal that is unfabricated, and therefore free from change—with no aging, illness, or death. Because the path is fabricated, the goal is not simply different from the path, it is radically different—so different that the final act of the path, before reaching the goal, is to abandon the path along with everything else. Although some skills developed along the path remain for those who have completed the path—their mindfulness, for instance, is constant—the calm, the pleasure, the equanimity, and even the consciousness present in the goal are radically separate from the calm, pleasure, equanimity, and consciousness developed on the path.

As for the controversies around the individual factors of the path, these tend to focus on three of the factors: right view, right mindfulness, and right concentration. The positions I have adopted on these factors are as follows:

• Right view is defined in terms of the four noble truths, rather than in terms of the three characteristics of inconstancy, stress, and not-self. This point would appear to be obvious when you look at the standard definition of right view, but all too often the three characteristics, interpreted as metaphysical principles, are taken as the underlying framework for right view, with the four noble truths squeezed to fit into that framework. In other words, the starting assumption is that all things are impermanent and stressful, and that therefore there’s no permanent, separate self. Suffering is caused by the craving and clinging that arise when the “truth” of no self isn’t realized, because all suffering comes from clinging to things that will change. However, when this “truth” is realized, the mind will understand that there’s nothing lasting to cling to, and so—growing equanimous to all things—will stop suffering.

However, as we will see, even though the Buddha often discussed the suffering that comes from clinging to inconstant things (§123), he never said that clinging entails suffering only when focused on things that are inconstant. In MN 52 and AN 9:36 (§312), for instance, he notes that it’s possible to cling to the unfabricated, and that that particular clinging has to be abandoned for suffering to truly end. In other words, the suffering lies in the activity of the clinging and not in the inconstancy of the object clung to. This may seem like a subtle point, relevant only to the highest levels of the practice, but it’s actually relevant to the beginning levels as well.

To begin with, the practice as a whole relies on the understanding that the problem lies not with the mind’s objects, but with the mind’s activities in relation to its objects. To focus on the question of when clinging is a worthwhile thing to do, rather than on the metaphysical status of what objects are, helps to keep this principle always in mind.

Also, if you’re alert to the fact that suffering comes from clinging more directly than from any change in the object clung to, then when you encounter anything in the practice that seems to be unchanging—such as a state of oneness or all-pervasive luminosity—you’re forewarned about the danger of clinging to it. In this way, you’re less likely to fall for any premature assumptions about having reached awakening, and you’re equipped to work your way free from those assumptions before they do harm.

Finally, by keeping the focus on the suffering inherent in all clinging, you can keep your practice from getting sidetracked into fruitless metaphysical arguments. Here it’s important to note that the Buddha never used the term “characteristics” to describe inconstancy, stress, and not-self. Instead, he termed them “perceptions” and taught that they be applied strategically for the purpose of inducing dispassion, when and where needed, in line with the duties of the four noble truths. Rather than being metaphysical positions—for example, that there is no self—these perceptions are tools for comprehending suffering and stress, abandoning their cause, and developing the path so as to realize the cessation of suffering. At different stages of the path, they have to be applied selectively. Only at the final stage are they applied to all objects. Then, when the goal is reached, they—as perceptions—have to be abandoned, too.

By making the four noble truths the framework of right view, and having the three perceptions function strategically within that framework, the Buddha was able to make this point clear. In this way, he was also able to avoid the “thicket of views” that grows when getting involved in the question of who or what lies behind sensory input, or whether or not there is a self (§229; SN 12:35; SN 44:10).

• Right mindfulness is a faculty of the active memory, and not a practice of open, non-reactive, radical acceptance of experiences as they arise and pass away of their own accord in the present moment. Some proponents of mindfulness as non-reactive acceptance have acknowledged that the Buddha defined mindfulness as a faculty of the memory, but then claim that he actually used the term in an entirely different sense—as bare attention, or non-reactive acceptance—when describing mindfulness practice. However, when we examine his instructions for mindfulness practice in context, we find that the function of right mindfulness throughout the practice is to remember the right principles to apply in shaping the present moment. In fact, instead of simply allowing things to arise and pass away, one of the prime duties of right mindfulness is to remember to make skillful dhammas (actions, events, mental qualities) arise and to keep them from passing away, at the same time making unskillful dhammas pass away and preventing them from arising again (§243). Acceptance plays a role in mindfulness practice only in the preliminary sense of being truthful to yourself about what’s actually arising in your awareness so that you can be ardent most effectively in shaping the present moment in the most skillful way.

• Right concentration consists of the four jhānas (states of mental absorption), which are states of settled, full-body awareness. These jhānas are one-pointed in the sense that the mind is gathered around a single object or theme, but not in the sense that the mind is reduced to a single point of awareness, in which all other awareness—of the body, of the senses, and of thoughts—is blotted out. Many of the misunderstandings around jhāna come from the fact that the mind can be reduced to a single point of awareness, and from the subsequent assumption that that single point is what “jhāna” must mean. This assumption is then supported by translating a Pāli term used to describe concentration—ek’aggatā—as “one-pointedness.” However, the part of this compound translated as “point”—agga—can also mean “gathering place.” When viewed in the context of the similes for describing the jhānas, all of which emphasize a full-body awareness, it’s obvious that agga here means “gathering place,” and not “point.”

Once we understand this term, we can see that the suttas’ teachings on jhāna are clear and consistent: When using the words “body” and “directed thought” to describe jhāna, for example, the suttas are not engaging in an esoteric language game where “body” means “not-body,” and “thought” means “not-thought.” At the same time, the compilers were not blind to their own language when stating that directed thought and ekaggatā can coexist in the mind (§289).

A correct understanding of jhāna is crucial to the practice because it supports the premise stated above: that the path is an eightfold path, with right mindfulness and right concentration serving mutually supportive and interpenetrating roles. If mindfulness were an open, accepting awareness, and concentration an awareness reduced to one point, with no consciousness of anything outside the point, the two factors could not be practiced at the same time. In fact, they would be incompatible. But when we define the terms in line with their usage in the Pāli suttas, they are not only compatible, but also mutually reinforcing.

And it’s because all the factors of the path are mutually reinforcing that they can deliver their goal. This fact is so important that it’s the organizing principle of the discussions in this book: Even though the factors of the path are given in linear order, with each factor building on the one(s) before it, in practice the factors support not only the ones succeeding them in the list but also the ones preceding them. In particular, right view, the first factor on the path, informs all of the following factors, but it can develop from its mundane through its transcendent and onto its final level only when the other factors are put into practice. On their own, the individual factors can lead to pleasant results within the confines of the cycle of birth, aging, illness, and death, but they can’t take you beyond the fires of the mind. Only when they work together can they lead beyond all fires: to the noble goal of total release from all suffering and stress.

How to read this book

If you are studying this book as part of a study group, I would suggest that you read each chapter in full, going through the sutta passages after reading the introduction to the chapter. If you are reading this book on your own, though, I would suggest reading the introductions for all ten chapters before delving into any of the sutta passages. That way you will have a complete overview to inform your understanding of what the passages mean and how they connect with one another.

To keep this book from becoming unwieldy, I have had to keep the discussions terse, sometimes reducing explanations to the bare bones of their basic points. If you find the terseness daunting, you may first want to read a more introductory book on the topic, such as The Noble Eightfold Path, which is a collection of some of my Dhamma talks on the path-factors. If, however, you would like to pursue in greater depth any of the topics raised in the discussions here, you can consult the books listed in the appendix of suggested readings at the back of the book.