[Buddha-l] Core teachings

[Richard P. Hayes]

On Tue, 2006-01-31 at 18:50 -0500, Richard Nance wrote:

> I have a feeling you're baiting us, Richard, but I'll bite.  I like
> your interpretation, but I don't know how to reconcile it with
> passages like "sabba.m bhikkhave dukkha.m" (SN IV, p. 28). 

I was unaware of that passage, because I almost never look at the
Samyutta-nikaya. So ignore my claim. It was mistaken. (One of my
professors long ago told me that the phrase "everything is dukkha" was
quite modern and had no traditional support. I now see the dangers of
believing professors uncritically.)

> (Perhaps your qualm is with the translation of dukkha as "suffering" 

I have never found a translation of that term I like. I have translated
it by such terms as pain, discontent, bother, nuisance, trouble,
unpleasantness, frustration, disappointment and irritation. Of this
slate of candidates, I prefer disappointment in a lot of contexts; this
was the term used by Ven Punnaji (not the one who gave ordination to
Bhikkhu Bodhi, but the one who used to be at Toronto Mahavihara), who
had a strong impact on my thinking about Buddhism (but some would say
not strong enough).

-- 
Richard