The Dalai Lama: The Four Noble Truths

In July 1996, His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama gave two days of teachings on the Four Noble Truths at the Barbican Hall in London. It marked an historic occasion as this was the first time he had given these lessons in the West and the first time that His Holiness had been invited to give a major teaching by a wide spectrum of Buddhist traditions.

How does an ordinary person become a Buddha, an enlightened one, a fully awakened, omniscient and compassionate human being, someone who has realized the meaning of existence? This is the central question of Buddhism. In his first teaching after his enlightenment, the Buddha presented the world with his answer. It consisted of four expositions or Noble Truths:

The truth of suffering.
The truth of the origin of suffering.
The truth of the cessation of suffering.
The path that leads to the cessation of suffering.