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Home Teachings The Five Aggregates The Burden of the Five Aggregates - Short Summary

The Burden of the Five Aggregates - Short Summary

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Article Index
The Burden of the Five Aggregates
Introduction
Upadana - Clingings
Carrying the Burden
Who Carries the Burden
Individual and Khanda
Purity of Gifts
Short Summary
Cause of Burden
Craving for Sensual Pleasures
Craving for Existence
Craving for Non-Existence
Throw Down the Burden
All Pages

Short Summary

All mundane teaching is in conventional language. When we say that one is an individual, a being, a woman, or a man, we are being realistic, for all mankind has accepted the descriptions given. Truth ordained by general consensus of opinion is samutisacca. In other words it is truth accepted by conventional language of mankind, and so it is no falsehood.

Not desiring to abandon convention, the Buddha, in his Bhara Sutta, made references to the porter as an individual. To sum up, the heavy burden is the five aggregates, which we regard as "I" or "Mine" and the one who carries it is the individual who is made up of the five aggregates. But be it noted that the five aggregates cannot be conceived as a separate entity from the individual. This has been extensively explained before. Some may not agree with the proposition that the five aggregates are both the burden and the porter. In that case., please regard the burden as the five aggregates which desire happiness and wellbeing and the porter as the five aggregates which are actually belabouring for the realization of that happiness and well-being.

Now that the burden and the porter have become recognizable, the only thing that remains to be considered is how to discard it. That will be the subject of my next lecture. Now that the time is up, I must close. May those who have given their respectful attention to the discourse relating to the Bhara Sutta be able to develop a sense of repugnance towards the five aggregates which oppress us as a heavy load of suffering, and to note the phenomena of the five aggregates arising and passing away at the six sense-doors, and eventually, by such noting or vipassana practice, to reach nibbāna where the burden can be thrown away.



 

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Quotes

" The man of wisdom, leaving the home of craving and having Nibbana as his goal, should give up dark, evil ways and cultivate pure, good ones. He should seek great delight in solitude, detachment and Nibbana, which an ordinary man finds so difficult to enjoy. He should also give up sensual pleasures, and clinging to nothing, should cleanse himself of all impurities of the mind. "

The Dhammapada


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