You're skipping some essential steps. According to the Buddha, volitional actions produce karma. That karma causes rebirth. That rebirth causes suffering, as live inherently involves suffering. Delete rebirth from this process and you end up with something else entirely. (Pop-Stoicism, perhaps?)

4NT is meaningless outside the context of the Buddha's theory of rebirth and karma.

I haven't said anything about "blind faith". However, 4NT is the Buddha's approach to mokṣa, that is, liberation from the cycle of death and rebirth. The whole point of 4NT is escaping the suffering resulting from that cycle by stopping rebirth.

I meant to say "theory of rebirth and karma".

Are you suggesting that the Four Noble Truths (4NT) are not dependent on a theory of karma? It's the very point of the Buddha's teachings in 4NT that rebirth implies suffering and that rebirth is caused by karma, which is caused by volition, which is rooted in craving.

@dhammametta.bsky.social — (Another question, if you don't mind.) What exactly is “so far removed from the path and practice that it’s hard to recognize as Dhamma at all”? Or in other words, how do *you* define “the path and practice” and “Dhamma”?

@dhammametta.bsky.social — What do you mean with “the roots and causes of dukkha at the direct experiential level”, and how does that relate to the Buddha’s idea that rebirth is caused by volition, which is rooted in craving (i.e., NT2)?

I'd consider those "exciting microbeers" rather boring as well, and far from "micro".

A fuzzy sphere; that is, a sphere with a vague outer boundary. I have no clue where the picture comes from.

The "great" requirement may put the bar a bit too high. I'm having a hard time finding any Buddhist scholars on Bluesky.