THEORY OF DEPENDENT ORIGINATION [ BUDDHA PHILOSOPHY ] SEM 1

                THEORY  OF DEPENDENT ORIGINATION

There is a spontaneous and universal law of causation which conditions the appearance of all events , mental and physical . This law [ dharma ] works automatically without the help of any consciousguides. In accordance , whenever a particular event [ cause ] appears , it is followed by another particular event [ effect ] . On getting the cause , an effect arises. The existence of everything is conditional and depends on a cause. Nothing appears by chance . This is called the theory of dependent origination. [PRATITYASAMUTPADA ] .

Buddha claim that everything we perceive possess existence but is depend on something else and that thing in turn does goes without leaving some effect.

FOR EX  A piece of paper does not come into existence spontaneously. It is made from wood pulp and water again the wood grows out of seeds or earlier trees.  . If we burn the paper the ashes and smoke appear. The paper never got disappeared but is transformed . The essential components of paper are always there and will always be there. A pot comes into existence because once a potter took the clay and formed it on a wheel and burn it into a fire .  Many components and circumstances were needed for the process.

In the same way , we did not spontaneously come into existence at birth we are the result of our parents , the consequences of their meeting. We are alive today because once we were born as a result of our parents meeting at earlier time. Everything is always  a consequence of something before ie. The origin of everything  is not unique it is dependent on a particular set of circumstances having happened . If you begin to see everything as dependent on everything else, then we have to look at the larger picture where everything we do or think will affects the future . As in the writing ‘ THE WORLD IS WOVEN WITH INTERCONECTED THREADS ‘

In essence , the Buddha did not see a separate and benevolent creator who could act on our behalf. He saw the interdependence of all life and the cause and effect of actions which create their own future.

. Suffering depends  on birth in this world.  Again the birth is caused is due to the desires [ tanha ] for the wordly objects. If we had the correct and the perfect knowledge about the transitory pain and the nature of the pain  then there would be no desire for them , birth would then cease and along with it also misery. Ignorance is therefore the root cause of impressions or tendencies that cause rebirth.

Thus, there is a twelve link chain o causation. The order and the number of links are not always the same but it come to be known as the full and standard account of the matter.

[a] suffering in life is due to the [b] birth which is due to [c] the will to born which is due to [d] the mental clinging of  the objects , and again clinging  again is due to the [e] thirst or the desire for the worldly objects which again is due to the [f ]  the sense experience which is due to the [g] the sense- object – contact which again is due to the [h] the six organs of the consciousness , which are dependent on  [i] the embryonic organisms [ composed of mind and body ] which are not developed without  [j] some intial consciousness which again hails from [k] the impressions of the experience  of past life which lastly are due to [l] ignorance of truth.

The twelve links are interpreted to cover the past, the present and he future life so that present life can be conviniently  explained with reference to the present and the future life. The twelve links are arranged with reference to the three periods  in the way proceeding from cause to effect .

NOTE : you can also elaborate the second noble truth about the cause of suffering to make your answer more valid. I’ve added some of the points you can add some of more