by Tang Huyen

The phrase "all is suffering" circulates freely in Buddhist commentary. Tang Huyen regarded it as a significant distortion. In this post from December 2003 — sparked by a casual Usenet exchange — he sets out the precise language of the Three or Four Marks of Existence across Pali, Sanskrit, and Chinese Agama sources, showing that suffering (dukkha) applies only to the compositions (saṅkhāra), not to all phenomena; and that the Third Mark, present in Chinese and Sanskrit sources but missing from the Pali, explicitly names Nirvana as peaceful. The post then turns to the positive nature of Nirvana — the four joys the Buddha describes for the awakened while still in the body — and concludes with a sharp commentary on Mrs. C. A. F. Rhys-Davids' editorial decision to elide a canonical statement that the Noble Truth of the arising of suffering is itself to be abandoned.

Tang Huyen (writing to talk.religion.buddhism and related groups) was a prolific and intellectually precise poster who drew on Lamotte, the Chinese Agamas, Pali commentaries, and Sanskrit texts with equal ease. His central argument — that Buddhism teaches suffering and its ending, not suffering as the final word — appears in many forms across his writing. This post is one of its clearest statements.

It is incorrect to say: All is suffering. The Buddha never says any such thing.

Only the compositions (saṅkhāra, the fourth aggregate) are suffering. All thing-events (dhamma) are devoid of self.

The three marks (lakṣaṇa, lakkhaṇa), the three or four seals (dharma-mudrā), the four summaries of the Law (dharmoddāna) are listed at Lamotte, Vimalakirti, 165, n. 51.

1. "All the compositions are impermanent" (Sanskrit anityāḥ sarva-saṃskārāḥ, Pali sabbe saṅkhārā aniccā).

2. "All the compositions are suffering" (Sanskrit duḥkhāḥ sarva-saṃskārāḥ, Pali sabbe saṅkhārā dukkhā).

3. "All the thing-events are no-self" (Sanskrit anātmānaḥ sarva-dharmāḥ, Pali sabbe dhammā anattā). [Notice the switch from the compositions to thing-events.]

4. "Nirvana is peaceful" (nirvāṇaṃ śāntam, śāntaṃ nirvāṇam, both in Sanskrit) is the third or fourth, depending on sources (not in Pali). [It happens in this life.]

The Chinese Conjoined Agama (Saṃyukta-Āgama) has four: all compositions are impermanent, all compositions are suffering, all thing-events are without self, Nirvana is peaceful. 66b14, 66c7 and 66c21.

Most Great Vehiclistic sources have the four. The Tibetans tend to follow All-Exists, Root-All-Exists, and Great Vehiclistic sources, and therefore mention four.

When something exists in the Chinese Āgamas and doesn't exist in the Pali Nikāyas, one shouldn't jump to the conclusion that the Pali is older and therefore sparer. The Pali often forgets and messes up what it had previously, and may well have had all four in the past. I take all four to come from the Buddha. However, this is a mere conjecture.

The first Noble Truth describes suffering and its various forms, the second Truth shows how suffering arises, the third shows that suffering is ended, and the fourth shows how to end it. Suffering encompasses only one part of experience, the part driven by desire which builds up a self to satisfy it. Technically desire fuels the compositions, which compose a self (itself a composition) to coordinate the various intentions to gratify desire, and those various intentions are also compositions.

Nibbāna is the state wherein the compositions are quiesced whilst one still is fully aware of what happens. The Buddha defines it as the calming of all the compositions (sabba-saṅkhāra-samatho). When all the compositions are quiesced, no more suffering occurs and happiness and joy occur, and that state is Nibbāna. Even it is devoid of self.

The Buddha teaches suffering and the ending of suffering (therefore not all is suffering), in this fathom-long body. The ending of suffering ushers in peace and joy, which he describes.

For the awakened while in life, the Buddha speaks of the four joys: joy of desirelessness, joy of aloofness, joy of calm, joy of awakening (nekkhama-sukha, paviveka-sukha, upasama-sukha, sambodha-sukha). MA, 191, 738a, SA, 485, 124b, MN, I, 454 (66), III, 110 (140), Harivarman, Tattva-siddhi, T, 32, 1646, 353c1-2.

The Potthapāda Sutta (DN 9, I, 195–196) says that there are three obtentions of existential state (atta-paṭilābha, literally acquisition of self): the obtention of the gross existential state, the mind-made state, the formless state respectively, corresponding to the desire realm, the form realm and the formless realm. The Buddha continues with the abandoning of the three obtentions:

"I teach the Law for the abandoning of the obtention of existential state so that you, who put the teaching into practice, afflicting states may be abandoned and purifying states may be increased, and that you may, by realisation yourselves here and now with direct knowledge enter into and abide in the fullness of understanding's perfection.... If it is thought that to do that is an abiding in suffering (dukkho ca kho vihāro ti), that is not so; on the contrary, it is by doing that there is gladness, happiness, tranquillity, mindfulness, watchfulness, and an abiding in joy (pamujjaṃ c' eva bhavissati pīti ca passadhi ca sati ca sampajañña ca, sukho ca vihāro)."

This state of joy or pleasure or happiness (sukha) is Nirvana; absent from it is suffering or pain (dukkha). Another word for Nirvana is along the same line: pīti "joy," in the freedom (vimutti) from the three poisons — desire, hatred, delusion.

"Monks! Joy (pīti) arises in a monk who, having extinguished the cankers (khīna-āsava), reflects on the mind liberated from desire, reflects on the mind liberated from hatred, reflects on the mind liberated from delusion." SN, IV, 236 (36, 29).

Our life is redeemed in this state of joy and gladness, when suffering has ended, in this very fathom-long body.

There is nothing negative about that.

As to the Second Truth, it is: "What is the Noble Truth of the origin of suffering? It is craving, which renews becoming, and is accompanied by delight and passion (tṛṣṇā paunarbhavikī nandī-rāga-sahagata), relishing here and here (tatra tatrābhinandinī)." DN, II, 308 (22), MA, 13, 435c–436a, SA, 71, 18c4, Waldschmidt, Catuṣpariṣatsūtra, 160. The three cravings are "craving for [existence in the] pleasure [modality], in the form [modality], and in the formless [modality]," according to MA, 29, 463a22, 114, 603a27, SA, 298, 85b, 895, 225a, 1177, 317a. In addition the Buddha says of the second Truth:

"this Holy Truth of the arisal of suffering must be given up (taṃ kho panidaṃ dukkha-samudayaṃ ariya-saccaṃ pahātabbaṃ, Skt. tat khalu duḥkha-samudayam ārya-satyam abhijñāya prahātavyam)." SA, 379, 103c19, SN, V, 422 (56, 11, 10), Saṅgha-bheda-vastu, I, 135, Mahā-vastu, III, 333.

He says what he says, and means it. After one has realized the four Holy Truths (and not all Buddhist saints, but only a few of them, do so), they are gone for good, period, end of discussion, all of them and not just the second one. But Mrs. C. A. F. Rhys-Davids, in n. 1 appended to Woodward's translation of the Kindred Sayings, V, 358 says: "But we must omit ariya-saccaṃ; otherwise the text would mean the Ariyan truth about the arising of Ill is to be put away. Craving has to be put away." Mrs. Rhys-Davids, no shrinking violet when it comes to expounding and defending her attachment to the self (atta), shrinks back from the unholy thought that a Holy Truth can and should be put away! Heaven forbid! Is there anything holy anymore? Her pious attachment is quite moving.

The Four Noble Truths, like all Buddhist teachings, are meant to be self-abandoning in their success. When their job is done, they're forsaken, and not cleaved. When they're true (i.e., successful), they're through.

Colophon

Written by Tang Huyen, posted to alt.religion.buddhism.theravada, alt.religion.buddhism.tibetan, talk.religion.buddhism, and alt.zen on December 28, 2003. Original Message-ID: [email protected].

Tang Huyen was one of the most intellectually rigorous contributors to the Buddhist Usenet groups of the 2000s, drawing on Pali, Sanskrit, Chinese Āgama, and Tibetan sources with equal ease and citing Étienne Lamotte, E. J. Thomas, Waldschmidt, and others alongside primary canon. His central argument in this post — that the common rendering "all is suffering" misreads the scope of the second mark, which applies to saṅkhāra (compositions) only, and that the Buddha's teaching encompasses both suffering and its positive resolution in joy — is one of the clearer statements of that position in the archive.

Preserved from the Usenet archive for the Good Work Library by the New Tianmu Anglican Church, 2026.

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