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  • Unknown's avatar

    hardie karges 6:17 pm on November 9, 2014 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: , CHRISTIANITY, ,   

    Buddhism 101: All Life is suffering—ouch! 

    https://www.flickr.com/photos/tonybphotos/298662953/in/set-72157594378558519/

    All Life is suffering. That’s the First Truth of Buddhism, of course, and as far as many people get in their study of Buddhism, with comments like, “That sounds so negative;” or maybe, “Doesn’t sound like much fun.” Such is life, though, life after childhood, at least, when the realities kick in, and it’s time to get a job—ooh, double ouch!

    The Second Truth doesn’t help much: the cause of suffering is desire. Yeow! I always thought Buddhists were cool, and had more fun than this. The Third Truth follows pretty logically: to remove the suffering, add water and allow to cool, i.e. remove the desire. Duh. For anyone still interested in something a little deeper than such simplistic action and reaction, there’s a Fourth Truth, the Middle Way, the avoidance of extremes. If you need that spelled out for you, there’s even an Eight-fold Path—very handy.

    The big boys of Buddhism, Inc. realize that that’s not the best business model, of course, not for fun-loving Americans, anyway, so furiously back-pedal the ‘suffering’ rap, dukkha in Sanskit, going on for hours about how Buddha he no speakee Engrish, and how translations are inadequate, and how he really didn’t mean ‘suffering’ as such. Ahem. Yes, he did. He meant exactly that. Saying he didn’t is like saying that Jesus wasn’t talking about rich people having difficulty getting to heaven. Yes, he was. (More …)

     
    • Esther Fabbricante's avatar

      Esther Fabbricante 5:36 pm on November 11, 2014 Permalink | Reply

      I don’t understand Buddhism at all –

  • Unknown's avatar

    hardie karges 9:16 am on October 19, 2014 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: , CHRISTIANITY, , , , , , , ,   

    Religions Gone Awry, Systems Rendered Asunder 

    Buddhist shrine in Sri Lanka

    Buddhist shrine in Sri Lanka

    Islam promotes discipline and ends up glorifying violence. Christianity promotes love and ends up glorifying sex. Buddhism promotes non-possession and ends up glorifying money. Hinduism promotes India. Judaism promotes Israel. How did our major religions go so badly wrong? Good question. An even better question is how to set them right again. It won’t be easy.

    Religion was long ago taken over by politics, and used as a tool for manipulation, souls for sale as the price of politics, people’s desire for meaning in life reduced to authoritarian submission and hopes for the best. Truth, beauty, and goodness have been traded for sex, money, and violence in some devil’s bargain, arbitrage of the soul, leveraged buy-outs of vestigial beliefs, so much debris and detritus… (More …)

     
    • chicagoja's avatar

      chicagoja 11:22 am on October 19, 2014 Permalink | Reply

      I agree whole-heartedly. However, understanding God never required a religion, a church or even a holy book.

  • Unknown's avatar

    hardie karges 4:20 pm on July 27, 2014 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: CHRISTIANITY, , ,   

    Let There Be God (and on the Seventh Day We created God)… 

     

     

    Christian God

    Christian God

    The idea of a Michelangelo-like anthropomorphic God, wrathful and scheming (before Jesus made him all love-y dove-y), bad teeth and all, thunderbolt in hand, is so absurd and fantastic, that I’ve long wondered how such nonsense ever got started, and moreover, how it persists. My idea is that it originates in the feedback over death, probably around the time Neanderthals (no, not Me-anderthals) began burying their dead.

    We humans look for meaning, of course, as such is our curse, so some must have wondered about these newly dead: Where do they go? What will they do when they get there? The idea that people are here one moment, then gone the next, is a tough pill to swallow, after all. Even dogs go through mourning. I suspect the phrase “WTF” also originated around this time.

    (More …)

     
  • Unknown's avatar

    hardie karges 4:08 pm on July 20, 2014 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: CHRISTIANITY, , , ,   

    #God as Big #Boss 

    God as Morgan Freeman

    God as Morgan Freeman

    “Remember the Sabbath to keep it holy,” definitely my favorite Commandment, “Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work,” etc., keeps us workaholics from working our selves to death, only problem is defining ‘work’ and separating it from non-work.

    But what if I enjoy work? Then is it okay? Are we supposed to be miserable six days a week?

    Then there’s the question of which day is the ‘true’ Sabbath. If you could be Muslim, Jew, and Christian too, some kind of 3-in-1 monotheist, then I guess you’d get a 3-day weekend. Now there’s a thought…

     
    • Kc's avatar

      Kc 10:36 pm on July 23, 2014 Permalink | Reply

      No repro. Here, and you? I recal you did not like condoms. Whatever happened to r list and his wife Vicki?

  • Unknown's avatar

    hardie karges 10:34 am on June 26, 2014 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: , CHRISTIANITY, , , ,   

    #Buddhism #Christianity #Islam: Time for a New Religion… 

    At their best Buddhism, Christianity and Islam are the head, heart and muscle of the One True Religion (as yet unnamed), the bush of which they all beat around furiously, passionately and mindfully, Buddhism with its ‘many books’ and philosophical approach, Christianity with its Sermon on the Mount and “Love Your Neighbor” One Best Commandment, Islam with its Qur’an Third Testament to the Torah, the Tales of Jesus, and much much more, maybe the greatest one book of all religions which includes all the others on a good day, whether in chapter or verse, sutra or suture…

    At their worst they degenerate into Buddhist passivity, purple passion and pragmatism of the worst kind, thousands of pragmatists plying the streets of Bangkok on any given night, sucking from the rich and giving to the kids, and parents, and anyone who’ll listen to the sad tales of femmes fatales and homos erectus…

    (More …)

     
  • Unknown's avatar

    hardie karges 11:36 am on May 12, 2008 Permalink | Reply
    Tags: , CHRISTIANITY, , ,   

    GOD’S MANY FACES 

    Jesus Christ is now starring on the God channel, speaking from the grave in tongues and English, parables shining through the fog with colored lights and music. He broadcasts his message with satellites and stars to lands where Muhammad still speaks with sword and scimitar. Buddha can’t compete head-to-head with his non-message of middling accommodation between extremes of aggressive violence and aggressive entertainment. He communicates heart-to-heart with a message of non-aggression and reconciliation at all costs. The costs can be steep, payable in dignity and self-esteem, poverty and need. Some things just can’t be bought and some things just can’t be sold. Buddha picks a middle path through a maze of lotuses on one side and chrysanthemums on the other. Jesus can’t make up his mind between the conformists and the protesters. Muhammad tolerates no pussy footing. The Muslim Channel blares from loudspeakers five times a day in thirty some-odd (some VERY odd) countries. The middle path for Islam lies somewhere between a rocket launcher and a razor blade. The true middle path chooses no sides. If it doesn’t lead to eternal bliss, at least it leads to another tomorrow and an infinite, if indefinite, future. All paths lead to God.

     
    • Joram Arentved's avatar

      Joram Arentved 5:02 pm on July 7, 2008 Permalink | Reply

      Helt i orden, Andreas V., hvis du VIL have det at vide, er det netop Buddhismen, du jo ér vel- kommen til at tage op med mig, så jeg lettere kan forklare & sætte dig & f.x. mig selv etc. ind i, hvad min status som ‘sund-fornuft-tilhænger’ egentligt er ensbetydende med & mærkeligt nok p.g.a. en ufortjent arbejdssag, jeg stadigvæk ikke rigtigt tror på, ikke rigtigt ved, om jeg kan
      se mig selv som ‘nu-igen-skyld’ i.
      Ven- & ærlig hilsen fra Din, fortroligst,
      Joram Arentved, Santiago, Chile.

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