The last of the six fundamental obstructions is false views, of which there are five kinds. Adding these to the previous five of the six fundamental obstructions gives us what are known in Buddhism as the ten fundamental obstructions. The five false views are (1) belief that the perceivable self, which is only a temporary aggregation of elements determined by cause and effect, is a true, persistent entity, (2) belief in either of the extreme views of eternal existence or the annihilation of existence, (3) rejection of the law of cause and effect, (4) belief in mistaken theories of cause and effect (such as those put forth by other teachers in Shakyamuni’s time, described in chapter two), and (5) belief that any of the previous four false views are the truth, that is, taking a mistaken ideal for a true ideal. The obstruction known as false views is ignorance of the truth taught by Buddhism and the adoption of false ideals in its stead. This is foolishness at its most stubborn and dangerous. Greed, anger, foolishness, pride, and doubt are known as the five dull obstructions, while the five false views are called the five sharp obstructions.
Basic Buddhist Concepts

All of these obstructions cloud the truth, lead to mistaken thoughts and actions, and prevent the realization of the ideal and thus are causes of suffering. To recognize suffering as suffering and see obstructions as obstructions calls for an understanding of the Buddhist religious ideal. The truths of suffering and its cause are based on the truth of the elimination of suffering. When the possibility of an end to suffering is glimpsed, the true nature of suffering and its causes become clear. Though they should be eliminated, suffering and its causes must be seen as aspects of reality, and the ideal of the elimination of suffering must be realized. Viewed in this way, suffering becomes the noble truth of suffering, and its cause the noble truth of the cause of suffering.Basic Buddhist Concepts

The Buddhist state of nirvana is not the absence of all things but the absence of the mistaken desires and actions that are the causes of suffering. In the state of nirvana, true and ideal activity continues in an even more vigorous fashion. Nirvana is to be found in the world of transmigration, though unbound by its fetters.

A physician who knows the illness, its cause, and the optimum condition of the body is able to prescribe a complete course of therapy, including such direct action as surgery, injections, and other medication as well as indirect treatment in the form of proper diet, rest, and exercise. In similar fashion, knowing the nature of suffering, its cause, and the condition free of suffering, the Buddha prescribes the Eightfold Path as a rational way to restore total spiritual health. The path, a system of practical discipline, must be connected by causal relations with the restoration of a sound spiritual condition, just as the physician’s therapy must have a cause-and-effect relation with the most rational way to restore good physical health. The fourth of the truths is the way to bring about perfect spiritual health.
Basic Buddhist Concepts

Buddhism employs the all-inclusive term klesha to mean the mistaken thoughts and actions that obstruct our attainment of enlightenment. (Kleshas are also thought of as impurities, and eliminating them is described as purifying the mind.) The most fundamental of these obstructions are the three poisons: greed, anger, and foolishness. Greed is desire for and attachment to things regarded as pleasant and enjoyable, and anger is aversion and resistance to things regarded as unpleasant and undesirable. Greed and anger are the same as craving, since craving is a mistaken desire, a mistaken love or hate of things. Foolishness, a lack of knowledge of the truth, is identical with ignorance in the Twelve-linked Chain of Dependent Origination. The three poisons, then, can be reduced to craving and ignorance, the fundamental causes of all suffering.
Basic Buddhist Concepts

Impermanence is not itself suffering. Human beings suffer because they fail to realize that all things change. Desiring constancy, they think their hopes are betrayed when they fail to find stability in a world that cannot offer it. For the person whose outlook and desires are mistaken, impermanence causes suffering. In the Buddhist’s long-term view, the inconstant condition of all mortals is suffering because all transient pleasures must pass into pain.
Basic Buddhist Concepts

When he set the Wheel of the Law in motion at Deer Park in Benares, the Buddha explained that birth is suffering, aging is suffering, illness is suffering, death is suffering, union with the hateful is suffering, separation from the beloved is suffering, failing to obtain the desired is sufferings, and all elements of our physical and psychological environments are suffering. The first four of these are called the four sufferings, and the entire series the eight sufferings.
Basic Buddhist Concepts

From documents setting forth the views of various sects and from Mahayana writings, it is evident that debate and conflict arose between the supporters of the older and newer forms of Buddhism. Yet dispute ended not in mutual destruction but in reflection and reform on both sides. The advent of several rival religions at about this time inspired all forms of Buddhism to cling together, thus sparing the Buddhist world the murderous sectarian rivalries that sundered Christianity.
Basic Buddhist Concepts

“Nothing has a persisting self” means that there is no essential or permanent being; nothing that does not come into being, change, and eventually pass out of being; nothing that exists of itself, without relation to other beings. Everything is constantly being transformed. All things are related in some way to all other things in the universe. Furthermore, there is no fixed reality behind the generation, change, and destruction of phenomena.
Basic Buddhist Concepts

The [Buddhist] reformers held that by overemphasizing questions of existence and karma (the results of actions, causality), the Abhidharma Buddhists had taken as their ideal an escapist nirvana without residue (emancipation from existence) divorced from the affairs of the world. This ran counter to the Buddha’s message, reiterated throughout his long ministry, that all beings are interrelated and must therefore strive to save the world by saving one another. The Buddha’s life – as well as his previous lives as a bodhisattva – had been single-mindedly oriented toward the salvation of others. He sought to achieve this goal, which is the bodhisattva ideal, by performing the six practices known as the Perfections (giving, observing the precepts, patience, striving, meditation, and wisdom) no matter what danger or discomfort this entailed.
Basic Buddhist Concepts