tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3965076219235086304.post7216884451977761172..comments2024-02-24T00:41:37.836-08:00Comments on The Buddha Diaries: A Perfect World--and the Insanity DonutPeter Clothierhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11525159413387378704noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3965076219235086304.post-58025078658141963532007-04-03T13:07:00.000-07:002007-04-03T13:07:00.000-07:00Thanks, Carly. It's good to have the Taoist view-...Thanks, Carly. It's good to have the Taoist view--and the excellent bottom-line advice. As for the translation, I really don't know. The text was brought in by another sangha member.Peter Clothierhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11525159413387378704noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3965076219235086304.post-8099509590414687422007-04-02T16:28:00.000-07:002007-04-02T16:28:00.000-07:00P: What traslation of the IChing did you read from...P: What traslation of the IChing did you read from? There is only one good one. The others paraphrase.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3965076219235086304.post-90355271767104934212007-04-02T16:24:00.000-07:002007-04-02T16:24:00.000-07:00I've spent all my time studying Lao Tzu, so I know...I've spent all my time studying Lao Tzu, so I know next to nothing about Buddhism. Buddhists spend all their time studying Buddhism, so I would imagine, except for B-scholars, they know the same about Taoist thinking (not Taoism, the post facto religion, a lesser thing). Lao Tzu contributed the Tao Te Ching, which Confucius and others expanded. My copy is open before me, as I read your blog. Serendipitously, The page open reads, <BR/><BR/>If someone is not as he should be, <BR/>He has misfortune, <BR/><BR/>Likewise, if man is not as he should be, he suffers disaster. Lao Tzu was no Pollyanna, and did not say, "the world is perfect; we can do nothing to change it", so far as I know. He said we could do everything to change it. He said, the superior man takes care to further the work of the Heavens and Earth in order that all men may benefit. And that everything serves to further and in time all things change "ching" into their opposites, indeed all things create their opposites. (universal law of circularity). He also says that what is ruined by man can be made good by man. One need only know one's place in the scheme, which is " as it should be", self-perpetuating, and self-evident. (No gods) Perhaps that is where the misquote comes from.<BR/><BR/>Lao Tzu knew man brings on disasters. Learning from nature we see that so does nature bring disasters. It all applies to clean air emissions and all else. And the new arises from the decayed. If man completely ruins the environment, something will survive in the universe. Man will watch from Mars, or worst case for our descendants, man will vanish, bugs will inherit Earth. But nature, being eternally perpetual, will go on. Maybe man will evolve into some sort of bug-man. He's more than halfway to being a cockroach anyway!<BR/><BR/>But Lao Tzu taught non-action, which, he explains is not idly standing by, but furthering the fundaments of nature in a wise way, not making "activities", but doing like nature does, letting things develop. If man does not learn this, he could perish, and he damn well knows it. Full well did LT know that nature gave man such a strong will to survive, that even on the brink of extinction, some will have prepared for it as he instructed, and indeed propagate, proliferate. Remember the book/movie, On The Beach?* We must remember, we are not very far along in the game of maintaining civilizations. If thousands die due to the blame attached to some wrongdoers, LT notes this is as it must be. Until man learns to put a stop to it. He himself fled a nation going down, for, as a sage he 'knew the seeds'. I think he was the first to write that.<BR/><BR/>To become free of blame.....is the greatest good man can do, says LT. But he has many teachings about the weak, the foolish, evil, the ruinous, etc, and how to deal with it all, and how to avoid it all. But to quote him, "For all that man has ears, he does not listen".<BR/><BR/>So Peter, "Don't worry. Be happy!" <BR/><BR/>* http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/On_The_BeachAnonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3965076219235086304.post-37202749352101343472007-04-02T09:51:00.000-07:002007-04-02T09:51:00.000-07:00What I gathered from the "perfect world" discussio...What I gathered from the "perfect world" discussion was that the world's karmic engine works "perfectly". Things are as they are as the result of the accumulated actions of all of us, not that the state of suffering (wars, famine, disease, etc.) is perfect. In other words, horrors in, horrors out.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com