To-Rei Zenji: Bodhisattva's Vow

To-Rei Zenji: Bodhisattva's Vow

(Translated by Robert Aitken)

Leader: I am only a simple disciple, but I offer these respectful words:
Assembly: When I regard the true nature of the many dharmas, I find them all to be sacred forms of the Tathagata's never- failing essence. Each particle of matter, each moment, is no other than the Tathagata's inexpressible radiance.
With this realization, our virtuous ancestors gave tender care to beasts and birds with compassionate minds and hearts. Among us, in our own daily lives, who is not reverently grateful for the protections of life: food, drink, and clothing! Though they are inanimate things, they are nonetheless the warm flesh and blood, the merciful incarnations of Buddha.
All the more, we can be especially sympathetic and affectionate with foolish people, particularly with someone who becomes a sworn enemy and persecutes us with abusive language. That very abuse conveys the Buddha's boundless loving-kindness. It is a compassionate device to liberate us entirely from the mean-spirited delusions we have built up with our wrongful conduct from the beginningless past.
With our open response to such abuse we completely relinquish ourselves, and the most profound and pure faith arises. At the peak of each thought a lotus flower opens, and on each flower there is revealed a Buddha. Everywhere is the Pure Land in its beauty. We see fully the Tathagata's radiant light right where we are.
May we retain this mind and extend it throughout the world so that we and all beings become mature in Buddha's wisdom.

Samuel Johnson (1709 - 1784)

The chains of habit are too weak to be felt until they are too strong to be broken.

Bertrand Russell (1872 - 1970) from Marriage and Morals

The fact that an opinion has been widely held is no evidence whatever that it is not utterly absurd; indeed in view of the silliness of the majority of mankind, a widespread belief is more likely to be foolish than sensible.

Buddha (563 - 483 BC)

Do not believe in anything simply because you have heard it. Do not believe in anything simply because it is spoken and rumored by many. Do not believe in anything simply because it is found written in your religious books. Do not believe in anything merely on the authority of your teachers and elders. Do not believe in traditions because they have been handed down for many generations. But after observation and analysis, when you find that anything agrees with reason and is conducive to the good and benefit of one and all, then accept it and live up to it.

General MacArthur: War and Spiritual Progress

"I know war as few other men now living know it,
and nothing to me is more revolting.

I have long advocated its complete abolition,
as its very destructiveness on both friend and foe
has rendered it useless as a means of settling international disputes.

Men since the beginning of time have sought peace.
Various methods through the ages have been attempted
to devise an international process to prevent or settle disputes
between nations... but...have never been successful.

Military alliances, balances of power, leagues of nations,
all in turn failed, leaving the only path
to be by way of the crucible of war.

The utter destructiveness of war now blocks out this alternative.
We have had our last chance.
If we will not devise some greater and more equitable system,
our Armageddon will be at our door.

The problem basically is theological
and involves a spiritual recrudescence,
an improvement of human character
that will synchronize with our almost matchless advances
in science, art, literature,
and all material and cultural developments
of the past two thousand years.
It must be of the spirit if we are to save the flesh."

- Douglas MacArthur (1880-1964)
Address to U.S. Congress, April 19, 1951

http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/treasures/trm048.html
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/macarthur/filmmore/reference/primary/macspeech05.html

Nisargadatta on "Who Am I"

Sri Nasargadatta Maharaj, from "I Am That"

To know what you are, you must first investigate and know what you are not.

Discover all that you are not---body, feelings, thoughts, time, space, this or that---nothing, concrete or abstract, which you perceive can be you. The very act of perceiving shows that you are not what you perceive.

The clearer you understand, that on the level of the mind you can be described in negative terms only, the quicker you will come to the end of your search, and realize that you are the limitless Being.