Andrew Furst's Blog, page 63

No More

Quotes -The path to right view is an arduous walk through fields of manure.

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Vertica – Tiny Drops (Photography)

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All Tiny Drop photos Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0)

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Ballade Of Worldly Wealth – Andrew Lang – Compass Songs

Money taketh town and wall,

Fort and ramp without a blow;

Money moves the merchants all,

While the tides shall ebb and flow;

Money maketh Evil show

Like the Good, and Truth like lies:

These alone can ne’er bestow

Youth, and health, and Paradise.

Money maketh festival,

Wine she buys, and beds can strow;

Round the necks of captains tall,

Money wins them chains to throw,

Marches soldiers to and fro,

Gaineth ladies with sweet eyes:

These alone can ne’er bestow

Youth, and health, and Paradise.

Money wins the priest his stall;

Money mitres buys, I trow,

Red hats for the Cardinal,

Abbeys for the novice low;

Money maketh sin as snow,

Place of penitence supplies:

These alone can ne’er bestow

 Compass Songs is an ongoing series of works by poets that I enjoy. Poetry, as the Zen Masters have said, is like a finger pointing to the moon. It speaks the unspeakable.

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What Good Are Guns? – Dialectic Two Step

Estimated reading time: 8 minute(s)

I recently posted the image above on social media and I got a thoughtful response from a friend

From a Buddhist perspective, I would think the fact that a gun is for killing a living being makes it hard to argue that its purpose is good.

She makes a good point.  From a moral standpoint, guns don’t score well.  Their purpose is to do harm.  Whether to people or to animals.  But then from another perspective assigning a moral value to an inanimate object doesn’t make sense. Guns can only do harm in the hands of a human.

My response was fairly pragmatic:

Weapons will always be a fact of life, from rocks to photon torpedoes. A weapon’s purpose is not necessarily good, but it exists and therefore must be considered. Guns can be used in ways that fall on different points of the moral spectrum.  I do not have a functioning gun in my house, but I don’t have a strong moral objection to people hunting deer for subsistence.  My wife grew up in Maine where many families relied very heavily on tagging a deer to feed their children. I’m much less sympathetic to sports hunting, especially for endangered species. On the other hand there is no question that using a gun to support criminal activity is unambiguously wrong. Here is where the battle lines are drawn. What deterrents are available to counter criminal use of firearms?

Buddhism does not carry with it the Christian admonition to turn the other cheek. I think that the Buddhist perspective acknowledges and accepts the use of deterrents. While none of us look fondly on the days of MAD (mutually assured destruction). It was effective. There were no nuclear wars between the US & The USSR.

In the US where the second amendment precludes banning guns, owning a gun is a logical deterrent to another person with a gun.But with any deterrence strategy, it’s subject to one-ups-man-ship. It’s starts with a .22 moves on to a .357 magnum, a silencer, and then a semi-automatic assault rifle.  So far the Supreme Court still agrees that tanks in the hands of the well-regulated militia is still beyond the pale, but who knows.

Of course, some day, guns will become a thing of the past, replaced by the next brilliant idea – e.g. the phaser, or some other futuristic instrument of death. Ownership of these new weapons will be subject to the same constitutional protections.  Here is why the conversation must continue.  The Constitution will forever be under interpretation in the context of future advancements in technology, medicine, patent law, commerce, and the make up of the so-called well-regulated militia.  The interpretations will change, just as the second amendment has been re-framed in the last 40 years. These changes are political and often reflect the collective voice of the people. So talking and being part of the conversation is important. Taking an intractable position, only removes you from the conversation, making you irrelevant. Keep talking people.

Dialectic Two-Step  is an ongoing series of my thoughts on questions that come my way.

Wisdom lies neither in fixity nor in change, but in the dialectic between the two. - Octavio

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Expections

Quotes -The path to right view is an arduous walk through fields of manure.

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The Last Great American Whale – Sunday Morning Coming Down

Lou Reed’s musings on man’s never-ending desire to control nature.  Seemed appropriate for Earth Day.

Sunday Morning Coming Down is an ongoing music  video series.  The songs fit my definition of music for a lazy couch bound Sunday morning.

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Important People? – Say What?

Say What?  is an ongoing series of laconic exchanges on Buddhism in the format of a comic strip. 

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Register For The Half Day Meditation Retreat

The Buddhist Meditation Group @ UUCR invites you to a morning meditation retreat

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The Oxherd Series – Reaching the Source – Modern Koans

The Oxherd Series is a collection of 10 images and commentary on the quest for enlightenment.  Its source is the Zen tradition. What you're reading here is a satirical, but not all together purposeless, treatment of these so called stages. Using excerpts from one of my favorite cartoons, Bob's Burgers, I hope to bring this old story into the present.

First there is a mountain, then there is no mountain, then there is

– Donovan

What is the work we’ve been doing? Work, precisely defined in the physical sciences is the constant force (F) multiplied by the displacement (s) of the object on which the force is applied

W = Fs

If we use this definition and apply it to Donovan’s paraphrasing of an old Zen adage, we’ve done nothing. To quantify that, our displacement = 0, so W = 0

W = F*0 = 0

All things are empty of inherent nature, but none the less, they are there before us - existing.
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So, as I’ve mentioned, the work we are doing is not the kind we’re used to. Yes, we’ve shifted our minds quite a bit and wrestled with some disturbing concepts (emptiness, thusness, and so on). But we’ve basically come to the world as it is. Net change of nothing. Our understanding of the self is nuanced.  We recognize that it is impermanent, always shifting. Our understanding of other has been similarly developed.  All things are empty of inherent nature, but none the less they are there before us – existing. Just not the way that we’ve grown to expect. Work – still zero.

The divine that we’ve all been pining for has been found in the realization that all things are temporary and therefore precious.  Gratitude, compassion, wisdom, and so on arise naturally from the spaces cleared of preconceptions, preferences, and aversions.  And yet, those spaces will fill back up as we fall back asleep and wake again everyday. Just like yesterday, and the day before. Total beans counted at the end of the day – nuthin’.

the rebirth of everything, including us, in each and every now.
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So, if we’re going nowhere, we must be there, and we must be where we started, at the source.  So what is “the source”? An ocean of being, from which waves and currents make the faces, hearts, and hands of each and every being. It is the rebirth of everything, including us, in each and every now.

Too many steps have been taken

returning to the root and the source.

Better to have been blind and deaf

from the beginning!

Dwelling in one’s true abode,

unconcerned with and without –

The river flows tranquilly on

and the flowers are red.

Next: In The World

I'd love to hear your thoughts in the comments below.

Modern Koans is an ongoing series that recognizes that good questions are often more important then their answers.

The riddles of God are more satisfying than the solutions of man. ― G.K. Chesterton

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I Resemble That Remark?

Quotes -The path to right view is an arduous walk through fields of manure.

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