The Ten and Twelve Links of Dependent Origination
Having learned about the Four Noble Truths and the Noble Eightfold Path, if Buddhist liberation denotes the total extinguishment of our five aggregates and eighteen elements, we might wonder, would it not be equal to reducing our existence to complete nothingness? In fact, during the First Turning of the Dharma Wheel, the Buddha also implicitly taught a permanent dharma through the Ten and Twelve Links of Dependent Origination. Among many others, the following incident recorded in the Agama sutras points to the insight of Nirvana.