“Suffering” is confusing because it’s imprecise. It just means “to experience pain”, though with a connotation of happening for a duration because the “fer” part of suffering means to bear as in to carry. But dukkha refers to the pain we create for ourselves by expecting the world to be other than it is. So while awakening does reduce suffering, it doesn’t eliminate it because awakening addresses dukkha, not, for example, physical pain signals from injury (though dealing with physical pain gets a lot easier when you’re not also dealing with dukkha, to the point that “pain” can start to look like something categorically different from what “pain” was pre-awakening).
Thanks! That makes sense to me, though I still think that it’s close enough when talking to non-meditators, at least if one says that the path offers a “drastic reduction in suffering” rather than an elimination of all suffering.
“Suffering” is confusing because it’s imprecise. It just means “to experience pain”, though with a connotation of happening for a duration because the “fer” part of suffering means to bear as in to carry. But dukkha refers to the pain we create for ourselves by expecting the world to be other than it is. So while awakening does reduce suffering, it doesn’t eliminate it because awakening addresses dukkha, not, for example, physical pain signals from injury (though dealing with physical pain gets a lot easier when you’re not also dealing with dukkha, to the point that “pain” can start to look like something categorically different from what “pain” was pre-awakening).
Thanks! That makes sense to me, though I still think that it’s close enough when talking to non-meditators, at least if one says that the path offers a “drastic reduction in suffering” rather than an elimination of all suffering.