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A Buddhists View
I dont know if this question has popped up before and if it has i am terribly sorry for starting a similair thread.
I am new to buddhism and truthfully i wouldnt call my self a buddhist yet as i am still trying to get my head around the buddhist way of thinking.
I am currently reading the Dalai Lama book "How To Practice" and have found it quite an interesting read.
One thing that i haven't come across yet and has been bugging me a bit is how a buddhist would handle a really bad situation in there life.
ie a loved one being murdered or the like.
I know that i am a big believer in the eye for an eye way of thinking.
Saying that i am hoping that buddhism will help me become a more tolerable person. But just now this is the kind of person that i am.
I am hoping to tend my first sangha this week so hopefully i will get a few more questions answered there. But this one has been bugging me for a few days now.
Regards
Frank
I am new to buddhism and truthfully i wouldnt call my self a buddhist yet as i am still trying to get my head around the buddhist way of thinking.
I am currently reading the Dalai Lama book "How To Practice" and have found it quite an interesting read.
One thing that i haven't come across yet and has been bugging me a bit is how a buddhist would handle a really bad situation in there life.
ie a loved one being murdered or the like.
I know that i am a big believer in the eye for an eye way of thinking.
Saying that i am hoping that buddhism will help me become a more tolerable person. But just now this is the kind of person that i am.
I am hoping to tend my first sangha this week so hopefully i will get a few more questions answered there. But this one has been bugging me for a few days now.
Regards
Frank
0
Comments
"An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind." Also, "two wrongs don't make a right."
It's true. In the example you provided, vengeance will not bring back a murdered loved one, nor will it provide any relief from the suffering caused by that person's loss. Revenge will only bring more suffering.
I do not describe myself as Buddhist (or anything else for that matter) but I have been deeply involved in my studies of Buddhism. As I understand it, a Buddhist would handle a bad situation the same way they handle other situations - with mindfulness, awareness, and compassion.
Becoming a Buddhist doesn't mean you will never get upset again, or feel sadness, or suffering ever again. Even experienced Buddhist masters admit to getting anxious, afraid, or even angry. The difference is that they train their minds to observe the emotion, and learn to transform it, rather than being swept away and by negativity.
I think in a nutshell, (and it's a very small nutshell) it's a case of hating the deed, not the do-er.
In a mild and far less traumatic way, you could say that if a member of your family does something to irritate you, you feel bad about what they have done, but that doesn't stop you loving them. You're just not too keen on what they've done, that's all....
In a far greater context, Buddhism is all for a person facing their responsibilities and taking the consequences of their actions.
if you've murdered someone, you should be punished by the law, and face the music. You did something that broke the law, now take your punishment.
BUT:
While the action is completely deplorable, and should be condemned, we cannot see into the mind of the murderer, why they did it and what prompted them to take another person's life.
A murderer - more often than not - is either a desperate and terribly distressed individual, or also knows the victim in some way, and has committed a crime with an impulsive passionate reason.
It's almost impossible to know what goes through their mind, but 9 times out of ten, they're not in their right mind in the first place.
Would you agree with this?
Would you agree that somebody taking the life of another person deliberately, must be in a distorted state of mind, whether through drugs or emotion?
There is the extraordinary story of the Tibetan Buddhist monk who was subjected to many years of appalling, inhuman, degrading treatment and torture by the Chinese, in prison. It would be easier to illustrate where he had not suffered physical after-effects, so many, varied, and severe were the injuries inflicted upon him, day after day, week after week, month after month and year after year, by his captors. He was put through unspeakable and unimaginable pain by them.
he was eventually released, and he travelled across Tibet and escaped, and made his way to Dharamsala, in Nepal, where the Dalai lama has based himself.
news of his survival and arrival soon spread, and he became the focus of the media.
During a press conference, this little monk was asked what, during his many years at the hands of his captors, he had most feared.
His reply still gives me goosebumps and brings tears to my eyes:
"In all those years, my greatest fear was losing my Compassion for the Chinese".
Now, see.... I always think to myself, "If he can do that.... it really shouldn't be too difficult a task for me to see fellow humans in their state of suffering, and have compassion for them......"
In my world, seeing someone that I love murdered would be tremendously painful. I imagine I would be angry at the perpetrator at first, though hopefully with time my anger would mature into understanding, letting me grieve on both sides of the action. The murderer and the victim were both part of a larger, even more sad tragedy.
I grew up with several different kinds of abuse happening to me, and as I grew out of the situations I was trapped in, I saw that both the hand that hits and the cheek that gets hit suffers, and then has to deal directly with the reactions. One of the progressions in Buddhism is the dissolving of the self, which helps to not take things personally, rather, look at the bigger picture and be compassionate for all sides of a happening. Does that make sense?
With warmth,
Matt
Fed- I'm somewhat familiar with that story, but if you can tell me where to find it or who the monk was I'd appreciate knowing. Thanks.
Edit: The monk is Palden Gyatso. I think all should research his story on the net.
"Hatred never ceases through hatred, but hatred ceases by love alone. This is the essence of the ancient and eternal law."
The second is from Shinran Shonin, the founder of Jodo Shinshu Buddhism (the largest denomination in Japan)
From a book called Tannisho (Hymn lamenting the deviations)in which a follower of Shinran named Yuien-bo recalls a conversation he had with Shinran:
Now I am not suggesting there is no reason to try to do good, but we each find ourselves in circumstances that will influence the choices we make.
A person born to good parents may make better choices than a person born to abusive parents.
A person born with a highly developed intelligence might make better choices than a person born with a mental challenge.
The reason judgmental religions and politics fail is because they have one measuring stick and only look at one side of the causality equation.
I'm also a big believer in eye for an eye way of thinking. However, the person who is going to take the "eye" of the person who did the wrong act is not me nor any other human being. The person who is going to take the eye of the person who did the wrong act is themselves. By committing such a wrong act they are, in fact, stabbing themselves in the eye. The stab wound may not show up immediately but it is guaranteed to show up and cause that person great suffering.
Even if they were to murder someone and get away "scot free" for the rest of their life, they would still not be "getting away" with anything. It's simply not possible to "get away with murder" or any other wrong act for that matter, even if they never get caught. Scot free is defined as: without consequences or penalties. However, such a thing simply does not exist. Seeing it this way, there is no need for revenge because that person is bringing revenge on themselves simply by committing the act to begin with and they will suffer the consequences regardless of anything else. Of course, that does not mean that you should not try to catch them.
Actually, FWIW, Dharamsala is in India
Mtns