Who said Buddhists were special? I have emailed the author to find out if she indeed said that in any book she's written and would like to know where she got her information.
Bottom line, Buddhists are just lucky to see reality the way it is, and can develop their mind to a point where we can serve others without sick delusional thinking or attachment.
I think your agenda has been exposed with your bottom line.
Agenda I have no stinky agenda or badges.
Bill
Good Luck.
Bill
The message from Jangchub contains these words:
. I have emailed the author to find
From this interview, which was widely publicised ?
"RD: Do you have a favourite animal?
Dalai Lama: Birds maybe. I feed birds, peaceful birds. I?m a nonviolent person, but if a hawk comes when I?m feeding birds, I lose my temper and get my air rifle.
RD: You have an air rifle?
Dalai Lama: Yes, although I shoot only to scare the hawks. " (end quote)
The same interview quotes His Holiness saying he eats some meat. Presumably it's killed first.
Janet
This is a whole lot different than saying His Holiness shoots aggressive birds at the feeders with a rifle. Miles different. He uses the sound of the air gun. He happens to do this not only to protect the birds of prey, but to help the predators and keep them from killing and creating more non-virtue, which will hold them for eons in the animal realm. They eat meat, but they kill with their talons and beak, ripping at flesh. For H.H. this is an act of compassion for the raptor.
Secondly, His Holiness eats meat only when his health absolutely requires it and when he goes to a special award dinner or has audience with people from other countries which don't know Buddhists are mostly vegetarians (I am) and will cook delicious meat shrimp, etc. When teaching, H.H. often says if you must eat meat, eat the meat of a large animal so only one life had to be taken to feed many people. Thus, shrimp are out of the question, or fish. He will eat it so not to be rude. It's not that important for a living Buddha to be concerned with karma because he no longer creates it.
This is not really a discussion for this newsgroup, but it frustrates me when people don't look at the whole scope, put all the information together accurately and report it using wisdom. I can't or won't allow someone to say His Holiness shoots birds with his rifle when I know he would rather die.
He has been quoted about it in an interview in the New York Times. Although, apparently, he just shoots in the direction of predatory birds, to scare them away from the smaller birds at is bird-feeder...
On the other hand, a good Buddhist would be willing to recognise that NOT all Buddhists are actually enlightened. And that the vast majority are still engaged in delusions and attachments and unhealthy agendas.
And a good Buddhist will work to recognise his/her OWN LACK of enlightenment.
Then again, there are plenty of not-so-skilled Buddhists who act elitist, and who assume (or at least present) the idea that, reading the sutras, and being on the path, magically equates being enlightened. It's called being snotty, which DOES mean an implication of being, "special."
I'm soooo glad that I have the humility to be the first category. And I try feel compassion for those in the second.
Because people who think that they already know everything, are thus refusing to ever learn anything new. And thus perpetuate their delusions and ignorance (and arrogance...)
How bout you take this to E-mail
John McWilliams wrote in news:g6adnZtMWJkhp0jYnZ2dnUVZ snipped-for-privacy@comcast.com:
I'm actually enjoying the discussion. Since there isn't much else going on right now, I don't think a dozen or so slightly off-topic posts are that big of a deal.
The message from Jangchub contains these words:
He fires a weapon of death and injury, whose pellets might well hit any bird, " just to make a sound" ? He could perfectly well make a scare-noise in some harmless way that's not associated with causing death and injury. A compressed air horn, clapping hands, or banging saucepan lids together. For him to buy, keep, use an air rifle, tacitly supports that industry and outlook.
He happens to do this not only to
I suspect he has more sense and humility than to pretend that.
Raptors kill/ dismember/ eat meat because otherwise they would die. The same justification he uses for his own meat consumption. At least birds don't pretend to only do it out of social courtesy. Why would birds killing and slicing meat with the body/tools provided by their creator for the purpose, be any more, or less virtuous, than a slaughterman picking up a tool designed for the purpose and using it to kill and butcher the meat which HH then eats?
As do raptors.
and when he goes to a special award dinner or has audience
Oh, puhlease.
He never travels incognito or alone. Wherever he goes, worldwide, he is escorted AND preceded by security operations and a whole team making his arrangements in advance in minute detail.His hosts know in advance who and what he is, and are instructed well in advance, what his needs are and the protocol for hosting the Dalai Lama. If hosts of such an eminent guest offer him a dinner menu that includes meat, it's because they have been pre-advised it won't cause offence, and he might choose to eat it.. Not, because they know nothing about Buddhism.
Aside from social occasions, he also chooses to eat meat off his own bat. In order for him to do so, someone HH believes does have karma to consider, has killed and prepared that flesh on his behalf. Are you saying, HH has no concern for that person's karma?
I can't or won't
Well, no. When faced with the option of "eat killed meat, or die", HH chose that animals would die rather than himself.
Janet
Is nothing sacred to you, even in part? I didn't think so. I've never seen one nice post to me in the entire time I've been coming to this newsgroup. I see nothing changes in the small minded. And no, not everyone knows the protocol. H.H. attendants do not instruct anyone as it is the hosts invitation and that said the host...oh forget it. I certainly don't need to defend The Dalai Lama. You just dislike me, so you make a feable attempt at talking about someone like he is a rock star.
The message from Jangchub contains these words:
Certainly not, the words and ideas of human beings on a newsgroup or in a press report.
I didn't think so. I've
Boohoo. It's usenet, not your fan club.
To correct your self-centred delusion of eternal victimhood, I defended you on this group only days ago, against a wrong accusation. Nothing to do with like or dislike of you, but because I knew it was inaccurate, and to my mind, in a discussion, truth and integrity matter. Even on usenet.
And no,
Thinking about it, would enlighten you.
Well, we agree on that. The DL needs your "defence", like a hole in the head.
(So much for "unattachment"!!!!!)
I have not likened anyone to a rock star. Surely you recognise why any internationally important figure on public engagements, is preceded by detailed arrangements, agreed in advance between the host and the VIP's team of assistants. The DL is no exception.
Janet.
Well, I have seen the Dalai Lama in person, at a lecture a few years ago.
He looked like a fairly regular old guy (except for his great booming deep voice.) He had a slight cold, and occasionally put a crumpled Kleenex to his nose.
I didn't feel any urge to worship him.
Puh-leeeze... He would probably feel great relief at having an encounter without all the trappings. He has been quoted as laughing at the pretentiousness of that title, "His Holiness."
A hypothetical visit to my home? I would show him my vegetable garden (see? ON-topic!) Then maybe lunch of store-bought rice plus my own veggies. And just hang out with some positive, one-to-one conversation. Maybe hoping that my home and possessions - quite modest by many western standards - wouldn't seem too proud or wealthy.
"Protocol"? Nah, wouldn't have time for that snotty little pretentiousness...
I'm now going to once again "unattach" myself to your silly statements about someone you've probably never seen in person, let alone know how his attendants give orders of protocol to hosts. It's not done. If the host asks, they give protocol. If not, they proceed.
The message from snipped-for-privacy@THE-DOMAIN-IN.SIG contains these words:
So have I. He's been to Scotland several times, and (like many people on this island) I have a longstanding connection to his Buddhist monk hosts.
I met him in a bitterly cold and windy snowstorm All the lay people were huddled in layers of fleece, waterproofs and boots. The Buddhist monks and nuns were wearing their thin draughty robes with bare arms and legs , they had walked quite a long way in these atrocious conditions and all were grey-blue with cold, covered in goosebumps and shivering. All except the Dalai Lama, who was just as exposed in his robes, had walked just as far in atrocious conditions, and was beaming joy and his bare skin glowing radiantly like a man who had just stepped out of a sauna. This was clearly not a regular guy :-)
He seemed a very down to earth person who wouldn't want you to :-)
"Advance arrangements", was my term. Not trappings, or "orders given "..(that was Victorias delusion)..
I'm not talking about "trappings and snotty pretentiousness". Just advance arrangements.
The DL does not move around surrounded by shoulder to shoulder uniformed guards, but don't be fooled by the apparently casual open simplicity of his personal approach. He's under heavy security. Your home would have been security vetted beforehand.
Janet
Humility does not go hand in hand with how much money we have or don't have. Protocol is for the practitioner, not the teacher.
I have tried just about everything to get rid of the moles, but after 22 years they are still in my yard.From what i have read trap killing them works the best, but takes alot of time and you have to find where they are digging also.Also my cat has caught quite a few of them,but they keep coming back.Have you thought about selling your home? Rick
Maybe a tactical nuke would do the job.......they are getting closer every day.
Back to His Holy Molee topic: We should all be mindful that we make life and death choices for many animals every day. Most of us eat animals that someone had to kill. Or we eat the eggs of animals that destroy the future life of the egg.
Sometimes we put our pet animals down when they get old or sick. Sometimes we carelessly subject our pets to risks such as when we expose them to harmful pesticides we spray around our gardens.
I got mad at a bluejay recently when I saw him eating the eggs of a finch nested on my window sill. The only thing I could do was hope that maybe someday my cat would catch him by surprise. My cat, whom I call Princess, is a great hunter, and almost every day finds a rodent to catch and torture. She's actually quite brutal when she catches something, throwing it around, chewing its head, flipping it high in the air, pawing it to try to make it move just a little so that she can pounce on it again. Sometimes, I feel sorry for the rodent. His life would have ended more painlessly had someone shot a pellet through his heart.
The lesson I take from these observations, is that we all kill living things, little or big animals, plants we don't like in a certain spot, etc. Agriculture (monoculture) in general is very destructive to the ecology and destroys the habitats of many beautiful critters. Yet we need the food it produces in order to survive. However, I feel better when I use a kinder way of taking the life of a critter that has feelings and wants to live, just like me.
----------------------- If you're interested in more about the damages caused by agriculture, read "On the Semantics of Evolution" available free online.
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