Page 171 - Popular Deities of Chinese Buddhism (Illustrated) and Symbols

he aw of the welve auses

is Law is also known as the Law of Dependent Origination

or the Wheel of Life (Paticca-Samuppada) and is a discourse on

the process of birth and death, and not a philosophical theory of

the evolution of the world. It deals with the cause of rebirth and

suffering with the view of helping mankind to get rid of their

ills of life. It is not an attempt to solve the riddle of an absolute

origin of life. It merely explains the ‘simple happening of a state,

dependent on its antecedent state’.

Ignorance of the truth of suffering, its cause, its end, and the way

to its end, is the main cause that sets the Wheel of Life in mo-

tion. e Buddha said: “Ignorance is the deep delusion wherein

we here so long are circling round’.

When ignorance is destroyed and turned into wisdom, all causal-

ity is shattered as in the case of the Buddhas and the Arahants.

is Law was preached especially for the benefit of those who

wish to attain Pratyekabuddhahood. By contemplating on it, they

will come to an understanding of the birth and death of all things

which results in the arising of their great inherent wisdom.

e Twelve Causes and their interdependent relationship are as

follows:

I causes A (Karma)

A causes C

C causes N and F (Individuality)

N and F causes the S E (Six spheres of Sense)

e S E causes C

 