Impermanence

Related concepts and fundamentals:Impermanence, also known as the philosophical problem of change, is a philosophical concept that is addressed in a variety of religions and philosophies. As long as there is attachment to things that are unstable, unreliable, changing and impermanent,there will be suffering –when they change, when they cease to bewhat we want them to be.(...)If craving is the cause of suffering, then the cessationof suffering will surely follow from 'the completefading away and ceasing of that very craving':its abandoning, relinquishing, releasing, letting go.How can that be a real thing which is never in the same state? ... for at the moment that the observer approaches, then they become other ... so that you cannot get any further in knowing their nature or state .... but if that which knows and that which is known exist ever ... then I do not think they can resemble a process or flux .... Impermanence, also known as the philosophical problem of change, is a philosophical concept that is addressed in a variety of religions and philosophies. The Pali word for impermanence, anicca, is a compound word consisting of 'a' meaning non-, and 'nicca' meaning 'constant, continuous, permanent'. While 'nicca' is the concept of continuity and permanence, 'anicca' refers to its exact opposite; the absence of permanence and continuity. The term appears in the Rigveda, and is synonymous with the Sanskrit term anitya (a + nitya). The term appears extensively in the Pali Canon. Impermanence, called anicca (Pāli) or anitya (Sanskrit), is one of the essential doctrines and a part of three marks of existence in Buddhism. The doctrine asserts that all of conditioned existence, without exception, is 'transient, evanescent, inconstant'. All temporal things, whether material or mental, are compounded objects in a continuous change of condition, subject to decline and destruction. The concept of impermanence is also found in various schools of Hinduism and Jainism. Anicca or impermanence is understood in Buddhism as the first of three marks of existence, the other two being dukkha (suffering, pain, unsatisfactoriness) and anatta (non-self, non-soul, no essence). All physical and mental events, states Buddhism, come into being and dissolve. Human life embodies this flux in the aging process, the cycle of repeated birth and death (Samsara), nothing lasts, and everything decays. This is applicable to all beings and their environs, including beings who have reincarnated in deva (god) and naraka (hell) realms. This is in contrast to nirvana, the reality that is Nicca, or knows no change, decay or death. Impermanence is intimately associated with the doctrine of anatta, according to which things have no essence, permanent self, or unchanging soul. The Buddha taught that because no physical or mental object is permanent, desires for or attachments to either causes suffering (dukkha). Understanding Anicca and Anatta are steps in the Buddhist’s spiritual progress toward enlightenment.Anicca doctrine is one of the foundational premises of Buddhism, which asserts that all physical and mental events are not metaphysically real, that they are not constant or permanent, they come into being and dissolve. Impermanence is one of trilakshana (three marks) of existence. It appears in Pali texts as, 'sabbe sankhara anicca, sabbe sankhara dukkha, sabbe dhamma anatta', which Szczurek translates as, 'all conditioned things are impermanent, all conditioned things are painful, all dhammas are without Self'. Everything, whether physical or mental, is a formation (Saṅkhāra), has a dependent origination and is impermanent. It arises, changes and disappears. According to Buddhism, everything in human life, all objects, as well as all beings whether in heavenly or hellish or earthly realms in Buddhist cosmology, is always changing, inconstant, undergoes rebirth and redeath (Samsara). This impermanence is a source of Dukkha. This is in contrast to nirvana, the reality that is Nicca, or knows no change, decay or death. Rupert Gethin on Four Noble Truths says: