Chapter 3 - Vedana Leads To Tanha

Because of pleasant or unpleasant feeling, there arises tanha. Tanha means perpetual craving or hunger. It craves for sensual objects that it does not have or it craves for more of the objects that it already has. It knows no satiety or satisfaction. For all the sensual objects to gratify it, its hunger is insatiable.

So a deva said that devas are like petas in that just as the petas are very hungry because of lack of anything to eat or drink in their realm, so also devas are always hungry although they indulge in all kinds of sensual pleasure. This sounds quite plausible. For the life span of a Tavatimsa deva means millions of years on earth and the life is still longer in other higher deva worlds such as Yama, Nimmanarati. Yet, in spite of their ceaseless and fabulously lifelong enjoyment of pleasure, the devas are never satisfied because their tanha is insatiable.

The same is true of human beings. Poor people seek sensual pleasure to the best of their ability. Of course, because of their poverty, they can never fulfil all their desires but equally insatiable is the craving of the rich, the high officials and the upper crust of society. This is due to the nature of tanha. The more it is fed, the more hungry it becomes and so it is worse among the rich than among the poor, more oppressive in wealthy countries than in poor countries.