We are what we think.
All that we are arises with our thoughts.
With our thoughts we make the world.
Speak or act with an impure mind
And trouble will follow you
As the wheel follows the Ox that draws the cart.
We are what we think.
All that we are arises with our thoughts.
With our thoughts we make the world.
Speak or act with a pure mind
And happiness will follow you
As your shadow, unshakable.
How can a troubled mind understand the way?
Your worst enemy cannot harm you
As much as your own thoughts, unguarded.
But once mastered,
No one can help you as much,
Not even your father or your mother.
How joyful to look upon the awakened
And to keep company with the wise.
Follow then the shining ones,
The wise, the awakened, the loving,
For they know how to work and forbear.
But if you cannot find
Friend or master to go with you,
Travel on alone–
Like a king who has given away his kingdom,
Like an elephant in the forest.
If the traveler can find
A virtuous and wise companion
Let him go with him joyfully
And overcome the dangers of the way.
Follow them
As the moon follows the path of the stars.
###
26
Dec 07
The San Francisco Tiger Christmas Attack and the Bogarting of God
Tiger kills San Francisco Zoo patron, injures two others — “One zoo visitor was mauled to death and two others severely injured when a Siberian tiger escaped from its grotto at the San Francisco Zoo early Christmas evening and went on a bloody rampage in front of terrified zoo patrons.”
Remember the Asian Tsunami a couple Christmas’s ago? What a birthday present for His Son! And how omnipotent of Him, right? Yet this time He willed a monstrous beast to feast on a young man while giving two others literally a gut-wrenching preview for when it was their turn. I’m starting to think that Jesus is hard to please.
Faith is so useful in these sorts of stark disillusioning situations, isn’t it? Oh let’s just all pray about it. I mean, surely He’ll continue answering our banal prayers for money, health and love, won’t he?
That God, He’s so mysterious and so very..
..wicked.
Oh wait, I know what’s going on with His Almighty. He’s been too busy with Extreme Makeover Home Edition. That must be it… But then… there were twenty or so thousand children painfully starving to death daily in Africa before that show premiered so I’m not sure.
I guess having a childlike unquestioning faith must really help with these sorts of annoying pesky realities.. well.. not in Africa I suppose. Well damn, I just thought of those poor Russian Beslan children blown to smithereens in their school gymnasium by Chechen terrorists a couple years ago.
God, you’ll still help me with my prayers though, right? Hello? God? Anyone there? Damn that Extreme Makeover Home Edition!