Precepts and Parables
Of all the gospels, the Sermon on the Mount was the portion that impressed me most, and I studied it more often than any other part. Nowhere else does Christ speak with such solemnity; nowhere…
Of all the gospels, the Sermon on the Mount was the portion that impressed me most, and I studied it more often than any other part. Nowhere else does Christ speak with such solemnity; nowhere…
The man who lies to himself can be more easily offended than any one. You know it is sometimes very pleasant to take offense, isn’t it? A man may know that nobody has insulted him,…
Ram Dass in Risk Being Human talk: “…and I began to expand my awareness to be able to look at the universe as it is and see the horrible beauty of it all…” An incomplete…
Care is something one learns by observing the way careful/caring people live. It is not a quality that can be learned from a text on moral psychology or Buddhist ethics but only by living and…
Practice recognition of complete emptiness of all things at all times, under every condition, everywhere, and you will learn by yourself what Buddha preached. Free from Desire: What I really only want, what Ma’s given…
In the summer of 2022, I found out I was not God. It might sound like a silly conclusion to come to, or a good one if I’m an otherwise self-absorbed, prideful narcissist. Whatever I…
Awkward and Embarrassing Things You happen to say something rude about someone, and a child who overhears it repeats your words in front of the person concerned.— Sei Shōnagon, The Pillow Book, translated by Meredith McKinney…
Like other works, [Samuel Johnson’s Lives of the Poets] is concerned with the nature, and, more importantly, the limits of human achievement. It assumes what its surrounding works assume: The continuity and dignity of the…
“Do you look at the stars a lot? Do you know them? Plato said that sight is not truly precious unless it helps us to know the stars, the planets, the moon, and the sun….
But whatever be the motive of insult, it is always best to overlook it, for folly scarcely can deserve resentment, and malice is punished by neglect. –Samuel Johnson, quoted in Paul Fussell, Samuel Johnson and the…