________________
102
Gandhi's Teachers : Rajchandra Ravjibhai Mehta
other end of the spectrum were schools which emphasized non-materialism and mortification of body to attain spiritual goals. Buddhism was born in such times of heterodoxy in Hindu philosophy and practices.22 Buddha warned against the two extremes of exclusive devotion to passions, sensual pleasures, and pagan ways of satisfying needs and habitual devotion to ignoble, painful, and unprofitable mortification of body to attain spiritual goals. He, instead, recommended the "Middle Path" to transcend worldly sufferings, end cycles of birth and death, and achieve the goal of moksha or nirvana. Buddha recommended nonviolence, non-hatred, renunciation, continence, and friendliness toward all.23 and four set of principles which form the core of Buddhism are: "Four Noble Truths," "Five Aggregates of Attachment," "Noble Eightfold Path," and "Eightfold Consciousness." The Four Noble Truths are: 1) there is suffering in living, 2) this suffering has causes which can be eliminated, 3) there is a way to eliminate the causes of the suffering, and 4) the Noble Eight-fold Path of right view, right aspirations, right speech, right conduct, right mode of living, right efforts, right mindfulness, and right rapture is the way to eliminate the causes of the suffering.24 The Five Aggregates of Attachment are the bases of the suffering and Buddha explains in one his sermons follows:25
Birth is suffering, old age is suffering, disease is suffering, death is suffering, to be united with the unpleasant is suffering, to be separated from the pleasant is suffering, not to receive what one craves is suffering; in brief, the five "Aggregates of Attachment" are suffering... This, O monks, is the sacred truth of the origin of suffering: it is the thirst of being which leads from birth to birth, together with lust and desire which finds gratification here and there; the thrust for pleasures, the thirst for being, the thirst for power... Follow the "Eightfold Path" and walk in purity to make an end of all suffering.
The Five Aggregates of Attachment are said to work through ignorance or avidya and selfish cravings or tanha26
Jain Education International
For Private & Personal Use Only
www.jainelibrary.org
