Editing Four Noble Truths (section)

==Historical development in early Buddhism==
{{See also|Pre-sectarian Buddhism}}

According to Anderson, "the four truths are recognized as perhaps the most important teaching of the Buddha."{{sfn|Anderson|1999|p=55}} Yet, as early as 1935 [[Caroline Rhys Davids]] wrote that for a teaching so central to Theravada Buddhism, it was missing from critical passages in the Pali canon.{{sfn|Anderson|1999|p=ix}} According to Gethin, the four truths and the eightfold path are only two lists of "literally hundreds of similar lists covering the whole range of the theory and practice of ancient Buddhism."{{sfn|Gethin|2003|p=20}} The position of the four truths within the canon raises questions, and has been investigated throughout the 19th and 20th centuries.{{sfn|Anderson|2001|pp=168–211}}

===Scholarly analysis of the oldest texts===
According to academic scholars, inconsistencies in the oldest texts may reveal developments in the oldest teachings.{{sfn|Vetter|1988|p=ix}}{{refn|group=note|name="development of teachings"}} While the Theravada-tradition holds that the Sutta Pitaka is "the definitive recension of the Buddha-word",{{sfn|Bhikkhu Bodhi|1995a|p=13}} and Theravadins argue that it is likely that the sutras date back to the Buddha himself, in an unbroken chain of oral transmission,<ref group=web>{{cite web |last1=Payutto |first1=P.A. |title=The Pali Canon What a Buddhist Must Know |url=http://www.watnyanaves.net/uploads/File/books/pdf/the_pali_canon_what_a_buddhist_must_know.pdf |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160304023143/http://www.watnyanaves.net/uploads/File/books/pdf/the_pali_canon_what_a_buddhist_must_know.pdf |archive-date=4 March 2016 |url-status=live}}</ref><ref group=web name="BS_BB">{{citation |last1=Sujato |first1=Bhante |author-link1=Bhante Sujato |last2=Brahmali |first2=Bhikkhu |title=The Authenticity of the Early Buddhist Texts |url=https://ocbs.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/authenticity.pdf |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20151224032237/http://ocbs.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/authenticity.pdf |archive-date=24 December 2015 |url-status=live |year=2015 |publisher=Chroniker Press |isbn=978-1312911505}}</ref>{{refn|group=note|[[Bhante Sujato|Bhikkhu Sujato]] & Bhikkhu Brahmali, p. 4: "Most academic scholars of Early Buddhism cautiously affirm that it is possible that the EBTS contain some authentic sayings of the Buddha. We contend that this drastically understates the evidence. A sympathetic assessment of relevant evidence shows that it is very likely that the bulk of the sayings in the EBTS that are attributed to the Buddha were actually spoken by him. It is very unlikely that most of these sayings are inauthentic.<ref group=web name="BS_BB"/>}} academic scholars have identified many such inconsistencies, and tried to explain them. Information of the oldest teachings of Buddhism, such as on the Four Noble Truths, has been obtained by analysis of the oldest texts and these inconsistencies, and are a matter of ongoing discussion and research.{{sfn|Bronkhorst|1993|p={{page needed|date=November 2020}}}}{{sfn|Vetter|1988}}{{sfn|Schmithausen|1981}}{{sfn|Gombrich|1997}} According to Schmithausen, three positions held by scholars of Buddhism can be distinguished regarding the possibility to retain knowledge of the oldest Buddhism:{{sfn|Bronkhorst|1993|p=vii}}
# "Stress on the fundamental homogeneity and substantial authenticity of at least a considerable part of the Nikayic materials;"{{refn|group=note|Well-known proponents of the first position are:<br />* [[A.K. Warder]]. According to A.K. Warder, in his 1970 publication "Indian Buddhism", from the oldest extant texts a common kernel can be drawn out,{{sfn|Warder|1999|loc=inside flap}} namely the [[Bodhipakkhiyādhammā]]. According to Warder, c.q. his publisher: "This kernel of doctrine is presumably common Buddhism of the period before the great schisms of the fourth and third centuries BC. It may be substantially the Buddhism of the Buddha himself, although this cannot be proved: at any rate it is a Buddhism presupposed by the schools as existing about a hundred years after the parinirvana of the Buddha, and there is no evidence to suggest that it was formulated by anyone else than the Buddha and his immediate followers."{{sfn|Warder|1999|loc=inside flap}}<br />* [[Richard Gombrich]]: "I have the greatest difficulty in accepting that the main edifice is not the work of a single genius. By "the main edifice" I mean the collections of the main body of sermons, the four Nikāyas, and of the main body of monastic rules."{{sfn|Gombrich|1997}}}}
# "Scepticism with regard to the possibility of retrieving the doctrine of earliest Buddhism;"{{refn|group=note|A proponent of the second position is Ronald Davidson: "While most scholars agree that there was a rough body of sacred literature (disputed)(sic) that a relatively early community (disputed)(sic) maintained and transmitted, we have little confidence that much, if any, of surviving Buddhist scripture is actually the word of the historic Buddha."{{sfn|Davidson|2003|p=147}}}}
# "Cautious optimism in this respect."{{refn|group=note|Well-known proponent of the third position are:<br />* J.W. de Jong: "It would be hypocritical to assert that nothing can be said about the doctrine of earliest Buddhism [...] the basic ideas of Buddhism found in the canonical writings could very well have been proclaimed by him [the Buddha], transmitted and developed by his disciples and, finally, codified in fixed formulas."{{sfn|Jong|1993|p=25}}<br />* Johannes Bronkhorst: "This position is to be preferred to (ii) for purely methodological reasons: only those who seek may find, even if no success is guaranteed."{{sfn|Bronkhorst|1993|p=vii}}<br />* Donald Lopez: "The original teachings of the historical Buddha are extremely difficult, if not impossible, to recover or reconstruct."{{sfn|Lopez|1995|p=4}}}}

===Development===

====Growing importance====
Buddhologist Eviatar Shulman proposes that in its original form the Four Truths were rooted in meditative perception of mental events, building on his analysis of the Pāli term ayam which is equivalent, he claims, to an immediate perception, such as this here right now in front of me.<ref>Shulman, Eviatar Rethinking the Buddha (Cambridge University Press, 2017), p. 140 ff.</ref>

According to Bronkhorst, the four truths may already have been formulated in earliest Buddhism, but did not have the central place they acquired in later buddhism.{{sfn|Bronkhorst|1993|p=107}} According to Anderson, only by the time of the commentaries, in the fifth century CE, did the four truths come to be identified in the Theravada tradition as the central teaching of the Buddha.{{sfn|Anderson|1999|pp=55–56}}{{refn|group=note|Anderson: "However, the four noble truths do not always appear in stories of the Buddha's enlightenment where we might expect to find them. This feature may indicate that the four noble truths emerged into the canonical tradition at a particular point and slowly became recognized as the first teaching of the Buddha. Speculations about early and late teachings must be made relative to other passages in the Pali canon because of a lack of supporting extratextual evidence. Nonetheless, it is still possible to suggest a certain historical development of the four noble truths within the Pali canon. What we will find is a doctrine that came to be identified as the central teaching of the Buddha by the time of the commentaries in the fifth century C.E."{{sfn|Anderson|1999|pp=55–56}}}} According to Anderson,

{{Blockquote|... the four noble truths were probably not part of the earliest strata of what came to be recognized as Buddhism, but that they emerged as a central teaching in a slightly later period that still preceded the final redactions of the various Buddhist canons.{{sfn|Anderson|1999|p=21}}}}

According to Feer and Anderson, the four truths probably entered the Sutta Pitaka from the Vinaya, the rules for monastic order.{{sfn|Anderson|1999|pp=74, 77}}{{refn|group=note|Anderson refers to Léon Feer, who already in 1870 "suggested the possibility that the four noble truths emerged into Buddhist literature through ''vinaya'' collections."{{sfn|Anderson|2001|p=183}} She also refers to Bareau, who noticed the consistency between the two versions in the ''Mahavagga'', part of the ''Vinaya'', and the ''Dhammacakkappavattana-sutta'' of the Buddha's enlightenment: "As Bareau noted, the consistency between these two versions of the Buddha's enlightenment is an indication that the redactors of the Theravada canon probably brought the two accounts into agreement with each other at a relatively late point in the formation of the canon.<br />Leon Feer had already suggested in 1870 that the versions of the four noble truths found in the sutras and suttas were derived from the vinaya rescensions in the larger body of Buddhist literature; Bareau's conclusion builds on this claim."{{sfn|Anderson|1999|p=74}}}} They were first added to enlightenment-stories which contain the Four Jhanas, replacing terms for "liberating insight".{{sfn|Anderson|1999|p=148}}{{refn|group=note|According to Schmithausen, in his often-cited article ''On some Aspects of Descriptions or Theories of 'Liberating Insight' and 'Enlightenment' in Early Buddhism'', the mention of the four noble truths as constituting "liberating insight", which is attained after mastering the Rupa Jhanas, is a later addition to texts such as Majjhima Nikaya 36.{{sfn|Schmithausen|1981}}{{sfn|Bronkhorst|1993|p={{page needed|date=November 2020}}}}{{sfn|Vetter|1988}}}} From there they were added to the biographical stories of the Buddha.{{sfn|Anderson|1999|p=17}}{{refn|group=note|Anderson refers to research by K.R. Norman, Bareau, Skilling, Schmithausen and Bronkhorst.{{sfn|Anderson|1999|pp=19–20}}}}

====Substituting "liberating insight"====
Scholars have noted inconsistencies in the presentations of the Buddha's enlightenment, and the Buddhist path to liberation, in the oldest sutras. They argue that these inconsistencies show that the Buddhist teachings evolved, either during the lifetime of the Buddha, or thereafter.<!--**START OF NOTE**-->{{refn|group=note|name="development of teachings"|See:
* La Vallee Possin (1937), ''Musila et Narada''; reprinted in Gombrich (2006), ''How Buddhism Began'', appendix
* Erich Frauwallner (1953), ''Geschichte der indischen Philosophie'', Band  ''Der Buddha und der Jina'' (pp. 147–272)
* Andre Bareau (1963), ''Recherches sur la biographiedu Buddha dans les Sutrapitaka et les Vinayapitaka anciens'', Ecole Francaise d'Extreme-Orient
* Schmithausen, ''On some Aspects of Descriptions or Theories of 'Liberating Insight' and 'Enlightenment' in Early Buddhism''. In: Studien zum Jainismus und Buddhismus (Gedenkschrift für Ludwig Alsdorf), hrsg. von Klaus Bruhn und Albrecht Wezler, Wiesbaden 1981, 199–250.
* {{Citation | last =Griffiths | first =Paul | year =1981 | title =Concentration or Insight; The Problematic of Theravada Buddhist Meditation-theory | journal =The Journal of the American Academy of Religion| issue =4 | pages =605–624 | doi =10.1093/jaarel/XLIX.4.605 }}
* K.R. Norman, [https://web.archive.org/web/20160309183447/http://ahandfulofleaves.org/documents/articles/the%20four%20noble%20truths_norman_pts_2003.pdf Four Noble Truths'']
* {{harvnb|Bronkhorst|1993|loc=chapter 8}}
* Tilman Vetter (1988), [https://web.archive.org/web/20150226092253/http://ahandfulofleaves.org/documents/The%20Ideas%20and%20Meditative%20Practices%20of%20Early%20Buddhism_Vetter.pdf ''The Ideas and Meditative Practices of Early Buddhism, by Tilmann Vetter'']
* {{cite book | author =Richard F. Gombrich | title =How Buddhism Began: The Conditioned Genesis of the Early Teachings |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=hQOAAgAAQBAJ | year =2006 | orig-year =1996 | publisher =Routledge | isbn =978-1-134-19639-5}}, chapter four
* {{harvnb|Anderson|1999}}
* {{harvnb|Wynne|2007}}}}<!--**END OF NOTE**--> According to the Japanese scholar Ui, the four truths are not the earliest representation of the Buddha's enlightenment. Instead, they are a rather late theory on the content of the Buddha's enlightenment.{{sfn|Hirakawa|1990|p=28}} According to Vetter and Bronkhorst, the earliest Buddhist path consisted of a set of practices which culminate in the practice of ''dhyana'',{{sfn|Vetter|1988|pp=xxi–xxxvii}}{{sfn|Bronkhorst|1993|pp=93–111}} leading to a calm of mind and [[Sati (Buddhism)|awareness]] (mindfulness){{sfn|Vetter|1988|p=xxv}} which according to Vetter ''is'' the liberation which is being sought.{{sfn|Vetter|1988|pp=xxi–xxxvii}}{{refn|group=note|Note that ''dhyana'' is not the same as ''samatha'', the calming of the mind by one-pointedly concentration. While ''dhyana'' also leads to a calm of mind, it aids in developing mindfulness, which is necessary to be aware of the arising of disturbing, selfish, thoughts and emotions, and to counter them. Wynne: "...the Buddha taught a 'middle way' between pure meditation and cognitive practices. The states of absorption induced by meditation were considered useful and necessary, but, in distinction from the meditative mainstream, their ultimate aim was insight. For the Buddha, it was vitally important that the meditative adept should apply his concentrative state to the practice of mindfulness (Sn 1070: ''satima''; Sn 1111: ''ajjhattañ ca bahiddha ca nabhinandato''; Sn 1113: ''ajjhattañ ca bahiddha ca natthi ti passato''), and work towards the attainment of insight. According to this view, meditation alone, the goal of the meditative mainstream, would have been harshly criticized in the earliest Buddhism."{{sfn|Wynne|2007|p=105}}}} Later on, "liberating insight" came to be regarded as equally liberating.{{sfn|Gombrich|1997|pp=99–102}}{{sfn|Bronkhorst|1993|pp=93–111}} This "liberating insight" came to be exemplified by ''prajna'', or the insight in the "four truths",{{sfn|Gombrich|1997|pp=99–102}}{{sfn|Bronkhorst|1993|pp=93–111}} but also by other elements of the Buddhist teachings.{{sfn|Vetter|1988|pp=xxi–xxxvii}}{{sfn|Bronkhorst|1993|loc=chapter 7}} According to Vetter and Bronkhorst, this growing importance of "liberating insight" was a response to other religious groups in India, which held that a liberating insight was indispensable for ''[[moksha]]'', liberation from rebirth.{{sfn|Vetter|1988|pp=xxxii, xxxiii}}{{sfn|Bronkhorst|1993|pp=54–55, 96, 99}}{{refn|group=note|Tillmann Vetter: "Very likely the cause was the growing influence of a non-Buddhist spiritual environment·which claimed that one can be released only by some truth or higher knowledge. In addition the alternative (and perhaps sometimes competing) method of discriminating insight (fully established after the introduction of the four noble truths) seemed to conform so well to this claim."{{sfn|Vetter|1988|p=xxxiii}}<br /><br />According to Bronkhorst, this happened under influence of the "mainstream of meditation", that is, Vedic-Brahmanical oriented groups, which believed that the cessation of action could not be liberating, since action can never be fully stopped. Their solution was to postulate a fundamental difference between the inner soul or self and the body. The inner self is unchangeable, and unaffected by actions. By insight into this difference, one was liberated. To equal this emphasis on insight, Buddhists presented insight into their most essential teaching as equally liberating. What exactly was regarded as the central insight "varied along with what was considered most central to the teaching of the Buddha."{{sfn|Bronkhorst|1993|pp=54–55, 96, 99}}}} This change is reflected in the canon, where, according to Bronkhorst,

{{Blockquote|...the accounts which include the Four Noble Truths had a completely different conception of the process of liberation than the one which includes the Four Dhyanas and the destruction of the intoxicants.{{sfn|Bronkhorst|1993|p=110}}}}

According to Vetter and Bonkhorst, the ideas on what exactly constituted this "liberating insight" was not fixed but developed over time.{{sfn|Vetter|1988|pp=xxi–xxxvii}}{{sfn|Bronkhorst|1993|loc=chapter 7}} According to Bronkhorst, in [[Presectarian Buddhism|earliest Buddhism]] the four truths did not serve as a description of "liberating insight".{{sfn|Bronkhorst|1993|p=107}} Initially the term ''prajna'' served to denote this "liberating insight". Later on, ''prajna'' was replaced in the suttas by the "four truths".{{sfn|Bronkhorst|1993|pp=99–100, 102–111}}{{sfn|Anderson|1999|p={{page needed|date=November 2020}}}} This happened in those texts where practicing the four jhanas preceded the attainment of "liberating insight", and where this practice of the four jhanas then culminates in "liberating insight".{{sfn|Bronkhorst|1993|p=108}} This "liberating insight" came to be defined as "insight into the four truths", which is presented as the "liberating insight" which constituted the [[Enlightenment in Buddhism|awakening]], or "enlightenment" of the Buddha. When he understood these truths he was "enlightened" and liberated,{{refn|group=note|"Enlightenment" is a typical western term, which bears its own, specific western connotations, meanings and interpretations.{{sfn|Cohen|2006}}{{sfn|Sharf|1995}}{{sfn|Sharf|2000}}}} as reflected in Majjhima Nikaya 26:42: "his taints are destroyed by his seeing with wisdom."{{sfn|Bhikkhu Nanamoli (translator)|1995|p=268}}

Bronkhorst points to an inconsistency, noting that the four truths refer here to the eightfold path as the means to gain liberation, while the attainment of insight into the four truths is portrayed as liberating in itself.{{sfn|Bronkhorst|1993|p={{page needed|date=November 2020}}}} According to Bronkhorst, this is an inconsistency which reveals a change which took place over time in the composition of the sutras.{{sfn|Bronkhorst|1993|p={{page needed|date=November 2020}}}} An example of this substitution, and its consequences, is Majjhima Nikaya 36:42–43, which gives an account of the awakening of the Buddha.{{sfn|Bronkhorst|1993|pp=102–103}}

According to Schmithausen, the four truths were superseded by ''[[pratityasamutpada]]'', and still later, in the Hinayana schools, by the doctrine of the [[Anatta|non-existence of a substantial self or person]].{{sfn|Bronkhorst|1993|pp=100–101}} Schmithausen further states that still other descriptions of this "liberating insight" exist in the Buddhist canon:
{{Blockquote|"that the five Skandhas are impermanent, disagreeable, and neither the Self nor belonging to oneself";{{refn|group=note|Majjhima Nikaya 26}} "the contemplation of the arising and disappearance (''udayabbaya'') of the five Skandhas";{{refn|group=note|Anguttara Nikaya II.45 (PTS)}} "the realisation of the Skandhas as empty (''rittaka''), vain (''tucchaka'') and without any pith or substance (''asaraka'').{{refn|group=note|Samyutta Nikaya III.140–142 (PTS)}}{{sfn|Bronkhorst|1993|p=101}}}}

In contrast, Thanissaro Bikkhu presents the view that the four truths, [[pratityasamutpada]] and anatta are inextricably intertwined.<ref group=web>{{cite web |website=accestoinsight.org |title=Wings to Awakening Part 3 |url=https://www.accesstoinsight.org/lib/authors/thanissaro/wings/part3.html#part3-h-1}}</ref>

===Acquiring the ''dhamma-eye'' and destroying the ''āsavās''===
In their symbolic function, the sutras present the insight into the four truths as the culmination of the Buddha's path to awakening. In the ''Vinayapitaka'' and the ''Sutta-pitaka'' they have the same symbolic function, in a reenactment by his listeners of the Buddha's awakening by attaining the ''dhamma-eye''. In contrast, here this insight serves as the starting point to path-entry for his audience.{{sfn|Anderson|2001|pp=126, 132, 143}}{{sfn|Bronkhorst|2000|pp=79, 80}} These sutras present a repeated sequence of events:{{sfn|Anderson|2001|pp=132–134}}
# ''Annupubbikathā'' ("graduated talk"), in which the Buddha explains the four truths; this talk frees the listener from the hindrances;
# This talk opens the ''dhammacakkhu'' ("dhamma eye"), and knowledge arises: "all that has the nature of arising has the nature of ending";{{sfn|Anderson|2001|p=132}}{{refn|group=note|In effect to the exposition of the four truths, as presented in the ''Dhammacakkappavattana Sutta'', the "dustless, stainless Dhamma eye" arose to Kondañña, stating: "Whatever is subject to origination is all subject to cessation."<ref group=web name="Dhammacakka"/>}}
# The request to become a member of the Buddhist order;
# A second talk by the Buddha, which destroys the ''āsavās'', impurities;
# The statement that "there are now ''x arahats'' in the world."

Yet, in other sutras, where the four truths have a propositional function, the comprehension of the four truths destroys the corruptions.{{sfn|Anderson|2001|p=146}} They do so in combination with the practice of the ''jhanas'' and the attainment of the divine eye, with which past lives and the working of rebirth are being seen.{{sfn|Anderson|2001|pp=146–147}}

According to Anderson, following Schmithausen and Bronkhorst, these two presentations give two different models of the path to liberation, reflecting their function as a symbol and as a proposition.{{sfn|Anderson|2001|p=149}} Most likely, the four truths were first associated with the culmination of the path in the destruction of the ''āsavās'', where they substituted the unspecified "liberating insight"; as the canon developed, they became more logically associated with the beginning of the Buddhist path.{{sfn|Anderson|2001|p=149}}{{sfn|Bronkhorst|2000|pp=79, 80}}

===Popularisation in the west===
According to Anderson there is a strong tendency within scholarship to present the four truths as the most essential teaching of Buddhism.{{sfn|Anderson|2001|p=196}} According to Anderson, the four truths have been simplified and popularized in western writings, due to "the colonial project of gaining control over Buddhism."{{sfn|Crosby|2013}}{{sfn|Anderson|1999|p=197}} According to Crosby, the Buddhist teachings are reduced to a "simple, single rationalized account", which has parallels in the reinterpretation of the Buddha in western literature.{{sfn|Crosby|2013}}

The presentation of the four truths as one of the most important teachings of the Buddha "has been [done] to reduce the four noble truths to a teaching that is accessible, pliable, and therefore readily appropriated by non-Buddhists."{{sfn|Anderson|2001|p=197}} There is a great variety of teachings in the Buddhist literature, which may be bewildering for those who are unaware of this variety.{{sfn|Anderson|2001|p=196}} The four truths are easily accessible in this regard, and are "readily [understood] by those outside the Buddhist traditions."{{sfn|Anderson|2001|pp=196–197}} For example Walpola Rahula's ''What the Buddha Taught'', a widely used introductory text for non-Buddhists, uses the four truths as a framework to present an overview of the Buddhist teachings.{{sfn|Anderson|2001|p=197}}

According to Harris, the British in the 19th century crafted new representations of Buddhism and the Buddha.{{sfn|Harris|2006|p=169}} 19th century missionaries studied Buddhism, to be more effective in their missionary efforts.{{sfn|Harris|2006|p=120}} The Buddha was de-mystified, and reduced from a "superhuman" to a "compassionate, heroic human", serving "western historical method and the missionary agenda of situating the Buddha firmly below the divine."{{sfn|Harris|2006|p=169}} The four truths were discovered by the British by reading the Buddhist texts, and were not immediately granted the central position they later received.{{sfn|Harris|2006|p=169}}

The writings of British missionaries show a growing emphasis on the four truths as being central to Buddhism, with somewhat different presentations of them.{{sfn|Harris|2006|pp=72–73}}{{refn|group=note| Whereas Gogerly wrote in 1861 "That sorrow is connected with existence in all its forms [and] [t]hat its continuance results from a continued desire of existence", Spencer Hardy wrote in 1866 that "there is sorrow connected with every mode of existence; that the cause of sorrow is desire."{{sfn|Harris|2006|pp=72–73}} Childers, drawing on Gogerly and Hardy, writes that "existence is suffering; human passion (''tanhã'' – desire) is the cause of continued existence."{{sfn|Harris|2006|p=120}}}} This colonial project had a strong influence on some strands of Buddhism, culminating in so-called [[Protestant Buddhism]], which incorporated several essentially Protestant attitudes regarding religion, such as the emphasis on written texts.{{sfn|Gombrich|Obeyesekere|1988}}{{sfn|McMahan|2008}} According to Gimello, Rahula's book is an example of this Protestant Buddhism, and "was created in an accommodating response to western expectations, and in nearly diametrical opposition to Buddhism as it had actually been practised in traditional Theravada."{{refn|group=note|Gimello (2004), as quoted in Taylor (2007).{{sfn|Taylor|2007|p=361}}}}

[[Hendrik Kern]] proposed in 1882 that the model of the four truths may be an analogy with classical Indian medicine, in which the four truths function as a medical diagnosis, and the Buddha is presented as a physician.{{sfn|Anderson|2001|p=189}}{{refn|group=note|Kern's model:{{sfn|Keown|2000|loc=loc. 909–911}}{{sfn|Lopez|2001|p=52}}{{sfn|Williams|Tribe|Wynne|2002|p=42}}

# ''The truth of dukkha:'' identifying the illness and the nature of the illness (the [[Medical diagnosis|diagnosis]])
# ''The truth of origin:''  identifying the [[Cause (medicine)|causes of the illness]]
# ''The truth of cessation:'' identifying a cure for the illness (the [[prognosis]])
# ''The truth of the path:'' recommending a treatment for the illness that can bring about a cure (the [[Medical prescription|prescription]])}} Kern's analogy became rather popular,{{sfn|Anderson|2001|p=189}}{{refn|group=note|See,{{sfn|Keown|2000|loc=loc. 909–911}}{{sfn|Lopez|2001|p=52}}{{sfn|Williams|Tribe|Wynne|2002|p=42}}}} but "there is not sufficient historical evidence to conclude that the Buddha deliberately drew upon a clearly defined medical model for his fourfold analysis of human pain."{{sfn|Anderson|2001|p=189}}

According to Anderson, those scholars who did not place the four truths at the center of Buddhism, either "located the four truths in a fuller reading of the Theravada canon and the larger context of South Asian literature", or "located the teaching within an experience of Buddhism as practiced in a contemporary setting."{{sfn|Anderson|2001|p=198}} According to Anderson, "these autors suggest a more complex reading of the four noble truths than those who locate the teaching as the key to or as a crucial element within the grand scheme of Buddhism."{{sfn|Anderson|2001|p=198}}