Nyanatiloka Buddhist Dictionary

third truth (Nibbána) to be realized; the fourth truth (the path) to be cultivated."The truth of suffering is to be compared with a disease, the truth of the origin ofsuffering with the cause of the disease, the truth of extinction of suffering with the cureof the disease, the truth of the path with the medicine" (Vis.M. XVI).In the ultimate sense, all these 4 truths are to be considered as empty of a self, since thereis no feeling agent, no doer, no liberated one. no one who follows along the path. Therefore itis said:'Mere suffering exists, no sufferer is found.The deed is, but no doer of the deed is there.Nibbána is, but not the man that enters it.The path is, but no traveller on it is seen.'The first truth and the second truth are emptyOf permanency, joy, of self and beauty;The Deathless Realm is empty of an ego,And free from permanency, joy and self, the path.' (Vis.M. XVI)It must be pointed out that the first truth does not merely refer to actual suffering, i.e. tosuffering as feeling, but that it shows that, in consequence of the universal law ofimpermanency, all the phenomena of existence whatsoever, even the sublimest states ofexistence, are subject to change and dissolution, and hence are miserable and unsatisfactory;and that thus, without exception, they all contain in themselves the germ of suffering. Cf.Guide, p. 101f.Regarding the true nature of the path, s. magga.Literature: Dhammacakkappavattana Sutta (in WHEEL 17 and BODHI LEAVES);M. 141; Sacca-Samyutta (S. LVI); Sacca Vibhanga; W. of B.; Vis.M. XVI: TheFour Noble Truths by Francis Story (WHEEL 34/35); The Significance of the 4Noble Truths by V. F. Gunaratna (WHEEL 123).sacca-ñána: 'knowledge of the truth' (s. prec.), may be of 2 kinds: (1) knowledge consistingin understanding (anubodha-ñána) and (2) knowledge consisting in penetration(pativedha-ñána), i.e. realization. Cf. pariyatti."Amongst these, (1) 'knowledge consisting in understanding' is mundane (lokiya, q.v.), and itsarising with regard to the extinction of suffering, and to the path, is due to hearsay etc.(therefore not due to one's realization of the supermundane path; s. ariya-puggala) (2)'Knowledge consisting in penetration', however, is supermundane (lokuttara), with theextinction of suffering (= nibbána) as object, it penetrates with its functions the 4 truths (inone and the same moment), as it is said (S. LVI, 30): whosoever, o monks, understandssuffering, he also understands the origin of suffering, the extinction of suffering, and thepath leading to the extinction of suffering' " (Vis.M. XVI, 84). See visuddhi (end of article)."Of the mundane kinds of knowledge, however, the knowledge of suffering by which (various)prejudices are overcome, dispels the personality-belief (sakkáya-dilthi, s. ditthi). The