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Truthful Zen Teacher
These exhortations pertain to basic standards in Soto Zen after Dogen (1200-53)Why is one guru not accepted because valuable, and the other accepted and treasured because cheap?
To practice true and fair, take up bland truthfulness from the onset.
Do not worry whether the other person understands or not; just answer the truth. [Dog 41, 107]
Out of ten of you, all ten should gain enlightenment. [Dog 16]
Why is one (jewel) not accepted because it is valuable, and the other accepted and treasured because it is cheap? [Dog 75] ◊
A Zen monk must always answer truthfully about the teachings and essentials of practice. One must also take into account the customs of the country [Dog 107, 24].
Do not spend your time in idleness.
A wrong view must be corrected [cf. Dog 107, 20]
It is man who discriminates the shallow and the deep. Just practice zazen, sit alone like a person deaf and dumb [cf. Dog 75]
"Just recognise as the Buddha what you see now before your eyes," said Dogen. [Dog 15]◊◊
Do not idle away your time.
"Recognise as the Buddha what you see now," said Dogen. And who do you see in a mirror? Be honest.
Focus of Mind
You can hardly be admonished to dive inside, that is, contemplate - and at the same time think that sobbing and wailing ritually or half-neurotically for the Mother God is the solution. That is in stark contrast to the sensible, regular contemplative task. Compare titbits from The Cloud of Unknowing [Clu] on-site. Advancing focus of mind trains the mind by stages in time. Guard the mind to rise in attention, that is, almost to go to sleep. Some train their minds for it for decades.Here is how to, in a nutshell: Rise by pointed attention — Guard the mind against what offends — Keep guarding the mind carefully — Train your mind in stupefying ways from there.
In other words, by sustained, pointed attention (focus) the mind rises, that is, becomes interiorised. This is a basic or pivoting point of very many effective meditation methods.One will need to have his wits about him — Find a secure spot to practice, and guard your mind well in between your meditation sessions. The specifics of many meditation manuals seek to establish just that — Ways to train the mind are enumerated in Patanjali's Yoga Sutras, part 3. [Mec 31]
What is called centring prayer can be a neat and tidy way in essence.
Apply only what is sane, not everything called great
"Look at creation with seeing eyes," says Yogananda. Yogananda was badly hurt mentally as a child and youngster; he wanted to kill himself at one time, eleven years old. Note the word "Self-Flogging" is not used here, but he took up "Wail for Mom and She surely comes" as time went by and halfway instituted such Great Mom Wailing among followers.To look at creation with seeing eyes is in part on top of fair terms that matter, we can check what he stresses, to see if he does far too much havoc. His main constructs and concepts, his main outputs - there are severe faults and flaws in them. Back off from great-looking, often inconsistent demagoguery.
To find an honest guru or helper, become very honest yourself - first. First things first: First things are the concepts and constructs employed over and over. Many terms found in religious contexts, are charged with attitudes. What about this?
"It will be all over for us . . . the next generation will not give us a thought." -
Yogananda [Ak 344]
The next generation and the next came, yet the guru's followers made sure his words did not come to pass. They published his talks and other works.
Bragging has many sides to it
SRF has fostered a "WE FIND HIS GUIDELINES INFALLIBLE" attitude on behalf of their Chosen One (Yogananda) against abounding evidence to the contrary.Narcissistic sinning may be tough to get to grips with.
Fools cannot be trusted, not even if well gilded.
Behind the bragging "I'm cosmic, my masters are great and big as cosmos" might lie a desire to look great or scare. Someone with a terible need to boast and scare may call his gurus Christs, almighty and all-knowing Christs. Yogananda did.
Impossible Black Pudding (Blood Food)
Have set alternatives. And "Do not back the wrong horse [American]." Which is worst, eating blood food or adultery? Few or none ask "Which US senators, governors and candidates for the presidency have eaten blood food?" On the other hand very many are occupied with possible indiscretions of the candidates, senators, and governors. However, you probably cannot tell which is worst, eating blood food or adultery. Or maybe you thought it was adultery [Acts 21:25]. When God set out to drown all of mankind, he let Noah live and have drunk sex with his daughters and not get up to paradise (die). Why? God found favour with him. And what about Bill Clinton! But there is more:Blood in the ancient world
"Keep my words to be worthy of me," insisted Jesus and had a lamb slaughtered for ritual ends. To kill and eat innocent beings is base. His apostles and the Holy Ghost discarded his adamant claims as soon as Acts 15 appeared, so to speak. You could be called to do even greater works [John 14;12]. Who knows?You are called to do greater works that saying things like "I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I haven't come to abolish them but to fulfill them." [Matthew 5;17-20, excerpt].
Now, the Old Testament would have removed any eater of blood food. "This is a lasting ordinance for the generations to come, wherever you live: You must not eat any fat or any blood." [Lev 3:16] "Wherever you live, you must not eat the blood of any bird or animal. If anyone eats blood, that person must be cut off from his people. (This law amounted to a death sentence in the ancient world.)'" [Lev 7:26-27] "Any Israelite or any alien living among them who eats any blood - I will set my face against that person who eats blood and will cut him off from his people . . . Therefore I say to the Israelites, "None of you may eat blood, nor may an alien living among you eat blood." [Lev 17:10, 12, 14]." Do not eat any meat with the blood still in it." [Lev 19:26] "You must not eat the blood; pour it out on the ground like water. Do not eat it, so that it may go well with you and your children after you, because you will be doing what is right in the eyes of the Lord. [Deut 12:24-25]"
Observe: "It is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins [Hebrews 10:4]." That outlook goes against large atonement parts of the Law of Moses.
Adultery in the ancient world
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| Thinking: "To be put to death for being raped looks like double trouble, and not fair at all!" |
The Law came after those "deeds" were done; they were not put to death. And by the way, "If a man lies with a man as one lies with a woman, both of them have done what is detestable. They must be put to death; their blood will be on their own heads. [Lev 20:13]." "If a man has sexual relations with an animal, he must be put to death, and you must kill the animal [Lev 20:15]." There is still more where these passages came from.
More on Blood Food
The view that eating blood food is about as bad as adultery is central for all under the deal of gentile followers (Acts 15; 21:25):James spoke up: "Brothers, it is my judgement that we should not make it difficult for the Gentiles who are turning to God. Instead we should write to them, telling them to abstain from food polluted by idols, from sexual immorality, from the meat of strangled animals and from blood."
Then the apostles and elders, with the whole church, decided it and sent the following letter:
"The apostles and elders, your brothers, To the Gentile believers in Antioch, Syria and Cilicia: Greetings.
We have all agreed - It seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us not to burden you with anything beyond the following requirements: You are to abstainYou'll do well to avoid these things. Farewell." [cf. Acts 15; 21:25].
- from food sacrificed to idols,
- from blood,
- from the meat of strangled animals
- and from sexual immorality.
Rubbing It In
During your next meal that contains blood food, such as hamburgers with blood proteins in them, according to Acts 15 and 21:25 God might be raging just as much as against adultery and idolatry and Saturday (Sabbath) work, if not more.Wild men caught the birds in flight,Adultery is at least put en par with black pudding - with blood food. This was to be one of the "four basic necessities" to know for a Gentile followers. All the others don'ts of Jesus and the Law were thrown overboard - it says. How strange. [Acts 15 and 21:25]
And learn, too late
Blood pudding is not to be on the plate.
Delicate home-made black pudding.
Speaking against adulterers while eating blood food smacks of throwing stones in a glass house. And God the Father decided to make blood food of his Son. Christianity even nowadays focuses on wine called blood as part of its figurative, cannibalistic ceremonialism and ritualism.
Called Clean and Cleared
Peter had a vision on a flat roof of a house in Joppa (Jaffa). He saw something like a large sheet being let down from heaven and saw four-footed animals of the earth, wild beasts, reptiles, and birds of the air in it. He heard a voice telling three times, "Get up, Peter. Kill and eat."Right then three men from Caesarea stopped at the house. The Spirit came on them.
The apostles said, "God has granted even the Gentiles repentance." [Acts 11:5-18]
Peter's vision suggests that eating reptiles and other ritually unclean animals - and Gentiles - was all right. Reptiles (and Gentiles?) were called clean and then they could be killed and butchered in millions, which happened. That side of the tale is perhaps overlooked.
Blah blah Continues
In the spreading Christianity there was soon no more Aramaic "mshikha" or Hebrew 'messiah', but a Greek status-word, "christ"."In the name of Jesus" is a slogan. He was called Jeshua - Vocals were originally missing - God's chosen people had defective manners and no written vowels or decadic units in their partly functional language (Hebrew).
European tradition has set up Greek terms like Jesos, Gesus and Maria instead of Jeshua and Miriam.
The literalists, who claims the power of His Name, had better say "In the name of Jeshua Mshikha," or something very close to that, in Aramaic. Pronouncing it may be hard - Now, add the liberating: "Hard work seldom pays - make someone else toil and reap his fruits. Take up the best from the USA while it is time - you know." Maybe not for a long time, but never say never. You may have to work hard for a few things as well. That could mean a lot of wasted time and effort.
Experiments
"Results." exclaimed Edison to an assistant marveling at the bewildering total of
his failures - 50,000 experiments for example, before he succeeded with a new storage
battery."Results? Why, man, I have gotten a lot of results. I know fifty-thousand things that won't work."
Literature
Ak: Yogananda, Pa.: Man's Eternal Quest. Los Angeles: Self-Realization Fellowship, 1975.
Clu: Johnston, William, ed. The Cloud of Unknowing and the Book of Privy Councelling. New ed. New York: Doubleday, 1973.
Dog: Masunaga, Reiho, tr. A Primer of Soto Zen. A Translation of Dogen's Shobogenzo Zuimonki. Honolulu: University Press, 1975.
Mec: Blakney, Raymond, tr. Meister Eckhart. New York: Harper, 1941.
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