Theos-Talk Archives (May 1996 Message tl00137)

Rich writes
>Maybe that makes me wishy-washy.  But I've decided tonight it's more
>important to support people wherever they are than to point out how far
>they've gone in my opinion from the source.  After we are all dead, what is
>really going to matter?  Which version of the planes of existence one held
>to?


Rich, I couldn't agree with you more. And it seems to me that allowing the
other person to follow their own vibes & inclinations isn't at all wishy
washy. To the contrary, I think it takes a bigger person to allow the next
guy the freedom of his thoughts & beliefs (provided they don't hurt anyone),
than it is to always insist that you're the only one who's right. You can't
convince anyway, at least not often.

Let me just add 2 quotes from my present favorite book "Violence &
Compassion" It's a dialogue between HH The Dalia Lama, & a French screen
writer Jean-Claude Carriere.
It's a very clear statement of Buddhism. It also applies Buddhism to present
day occurrences.

HH "Our Scriptures affirm that the moon is 100 miles above the earth, and
that the center of the earth is Mount Meru. If that mountain exists, we
should have found it a long time ago, or at least we should have discovered
some signs of its existence. Since that isn't the case, we have to distance
ourselves from the literal sense of the Scriptures."

JCC "And if someone refuses to do this?"

HH "That's their business. It's useless to waste our time arguing with them."

                        ..................

HH "I have had many visitors ...  feel very close to the force of compassion
that we find at the most constant level of our inconstant nature and that
the bodhisattva in some way personifies ... But this interest that people
have doesn't give us any right to judge others by our particularism. We
don't own the universal truth, we can offer only the results of a very long
reflection, which is ours"

JCC "So the notion of the bodhisattve would be relative too?"

HH " Of course. We have no right to apply it in general, to make it into a
universal dogma...."


Liesel