buddhism

Emancipation Day, VA Tech, and Hope

shaktinah — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 20:52:20 -0700

Today was Emancipation Day, a DC holiday. It is the anniversary of the day Lincoln freed the slaves within the District, nine months before he freed all slaves within the U.S. via the famous Emancipation Proclamation. It's interesting that we celebrate an event that is widely seen as motivated by political expediency. Emancipation of the slaves within DC was not based on the moral conviction that slavery is wrong, but rather in the hopes that freed DC slaves would fight for the Union side.

Speaking of Buddhism...

shaktinah — Tue, 15 Apr 2008 05:38:22 -0700

All this talk of perpetually peaceful Tibetan monks standing nobly in the face of the evil Chinese reminds me of a related pet peeve I have with respect to how many (not all) Westerners approach things Asian.

Activist Monks

shaktinah — Wed, 24 Oct 2007 18:06:00 -0700

An image seared into my psyche from the earliest years of my consciousness is that of a burning Vietnamese monk. The incident happened before my existence but was repeatedly shown during the long, drawn out war. The flames so violent, yet the monk so stoic. So Buddhist.

All is Buddha & Buddha is All

shaktinah — Fri, 21 Sep 2007 17:52:34 -0700

One of the tensions with which I continually struggle is trying to reconcile two ideas, both of which I believe to be true, and yet seem contradictory.

Buddhists will say "All is Buddha, Buddha is all." Does that mean that rape and murder and torture are Buddha??! And many theists will say, "EVERYTHING that exists exists only because of God. Otoh, we want to say that God is GOOD." Again, does this mean that rape and murder and torture are good? If not, why does a good God allow bad things?

Happy Birthday to the Buddha

shaktinah — Thu, 24 May 2007 16:56:35 -0700

According to the calendar that I snatched from my parents during Christmas because it is full of beautiful pictures of San Francisco that make be very homesick, it's the Buddha's birthday today.

Of course, that depends on whether you are Mahayana or Theravada Buddhist. If the former, then it's the Buddha's birthday today. If the latter, then you celebrated the Buddha's birthday, enlightenment, and death on the last full moon (May 2nd).

Karmic Lessons in Peacemaking

shaktinah — Thu, 03 May 2007 16:10:23 -0700

"You must be the change you wish to see in the world."
- Mahatma Gandhi

Like many realizations that I have, it takes me a long time to get to them and then once I do, it seems so obvious that I'm embarrassed that I hadn't realized it before. That's how I feel about a recent epiphany with respect to karma.