Paṭicca-samuppāda — "arising in dependence upon" — is the Buddha's account of how suffering originates and ceases. Twelve factors (nidānas) arise in mutual conditionality: none is a first cause, none stands alone. The chain does not describe a sequence in clock-time but a web of interdependence in which each factor avijjā (ignorance) through jarā-maraṇa (aging-death) contains and implies the others.

This telescoping quality means that understanding any one link fully requires understanding all the others. Click any nidāna below to expand its full description, cross-references, and interpretive dimensions.

Scholars disagree on what timeframe the twelve nidānas describe. Select a model to shift the emphasis throughout.

Enter any phenomenon — "anger", "a table", "craving for coffee", "a thought" — and see the twelve nidānas applied to it under the selected interpretive model.