Thus Buddha believed that all things were constantly going through a cycle, changing from one state to another. He considered nothing permanent. Buddha expressed his view of life as follows:

“Birth is suffering; decay is suffering; death is suffering; sorrow, lamentation, pain, grief, and despair are suffering; not to get what one desires is suffering.”

Buddha’s enlightenment had to do with how to escape from the endless cycle of rebirths. How would that be possible?

By recognizing the “Four Noble Truths,” which may be summarized as follows: (1) All living is painful; (2) Suffering is due to craving or desire; (3) When desire ceases there comes a release from suffering; (4) The way to release from suffering is to follow the Noble Eightfold Path consisting of four ethical precepts​—right speech, effort, conduct and work—​and four mental precepts​—right views, hopes, attentiveness and contemplation.

So it is desire, in Buddha’s opinion, that links a person to the chain of rebirths. To escape from it one must extinguish all desire for things pleasing to the senses. All craving for life as we know it must be suppressed. Meditation was viewed as a means to that end.

The Way to Nirvana

The kind of meditation that he advocated involves concentrating all of one’s attention on a single object, a certain part of the body or perhaps on a phrase or riddle. In time, the mind empties of all other thoughts, feelings and imagination. Through such meditation some have even developed “superhuman qualities” or abilities, including levitation, ability to project an image of themselves to a distant place and mental telepathy. It is said that one meditating can get to a point in which he is indifferent to pain or pleasure and no longer desires life or any of the pleasures associated with it. At this point he is said to become free of the necessity of rebirth. He has reached Nirvana. What is that?

Professor of Sanskrit Walter E. Clark explains that Nirvana is a state which “cannot be reached or described by human knowledge and words.” It is “utterly different from all things in the knowable world.”

Concerning the origin of the universe, Buddha said: “The origin of phenomenal existence is inconceivable, and the beginnings of beings obstructed by ignorance and ensnared by craving is not to be discovered.” Buddhist writings say that the universe evolved from the dispersed matter of a previous universe that wore out. In time Buddhists expect that the present one will dissolve and that out of it will arise another.

Zen Buddhist expert Daisetz T. Suzuki emphasized:

“To us Orientals . . . there is no God, no creator, no beginning of things, no ‘Word,’ no ‘Logos,’ no ‘nothing.’ Westerners would then exclaim, ‘It is all nonsense! It is absolutely unthinkable!’ Orientals would say, ‘You are right. As long as there is at all a “thinking” you cannot escape getting into the dilemma or the bottomless abyss of absurdity.’” [Italics ours]

What About Hope for the Future?

Does Buddhism offer any hope for the future? Buddhists divide an epoch of evolution and destruction of the universe into four “incalculable” periods. Buddha spoke of the length of one of these in this way: “Suppose a mountain of iron to be touched every hundred years by a muslin veil; the mountain will be destroyed before the Incalculable is at an end.” After four of these “incalculable” periods the whole cycle starts over again. So, according to Buddhist belief, evil and suffering have always existed and will continue forever as a part of recurring world cycles.

What about Nirvana as a hope? This, too, is questionable. Why so? Because Nirvana is supposed to signify that one has reached the end of one’s cycle of rebirths. Some Buddhist monks have even burned themselves to death to make sure they do not slip back into the rebirth cycle. But if a person is not to be reborn, what happens to him? Buddha considered this one of the “questions which tend not to edification.” He said:

“I have not elucidated that the saint exists after death; I have not elucidated that the saint does not exist after death; I have not elucidated that the saint both exists and does not exist after death; I have not elucidated that the saint neither exists nor does not exist after death.”