49. This Revolution Will Not Be Televised
50. 3 Coming False Flags
51. Top 5 Places NOT To Be In A Dollar Collapse
52. 5 Reasons Why American Riots Will Be The Worst In The World
Category: JUSTICE
The Occupy movement is an international protest movement against social and economic inequality, its primary goal being to make the economic structure and power relations in society fairer. Different local groups have different foci, but among the prime concerns is the claim that large corporations and the global financial system control the world in a way that disproportionately benefits a minority, undermines democracy and is unstable.
Occupy Wall Street was initiated by the Canadian activist group Adbusters, and partly inspired by the Arab Spring, especially Cairo’s Tahrir Square protests, and the Spanish Indignants. The movement commonly uses the slogan We are the 99%, the #Occupy hashtag format, and organizes through websites such as Occupy Together. According to the Washington Post, the movement, which has been described as a “democratic awakening” by Cornel West, is difficult to distill to a few demands. On October 12, the Los Angeles City Council became one of the first governmental bodies in the United States to adopt a resolution stating its informal support of the Occupy movement.
The first Occupy protest to receive wide coverage was Occupy Wall Street in New York City’s Zuccotti Park, which began on September 17, 2011. By October 9, Occupy protests had taken place or were ongoing in over 95 cities across 82 countries, and over 600 communities in the United States. Although most popular in the United States, Occupy has seen protests and occupations in dozens of other countries and on every continent. Each Occupy site set up a camp – including tents and outdoor kitchens – in a park or other public space, often near the city or town’s financial district, to establish a semi-permanent protest area.
For the first two months of the protest, authorities largely adopted a tolerant approach towards the movement, though this began to change in mid November with over a dozen camps being cleared in both the US and Europe. By the end of 2011 authorities had cleared out most of the major camps. The last remaining high profile camps – at Washington DC and at St Paul’s Cathedral in London – were cleared in February 2012. Yet protesters at many locations continue to organize and stage demonstrations.
The Occupy movement attracted less attention in the winter of 2011 compared with autumn, as participation and activity dropped. By February 2012 several journalists began suggesting that the movement was beginning to fade away, though this was frequently denied by occupiers themselves, who said that they had merely entered a less visible planning stage. By mid-March activity began to increase, with Occupy activists staging high profile rallies and attempting to re-occupy their original camp in Zuccotti Park.
Source – Wikipedia
Marianne Williamson Speaking About the Occupy Movement, Berkeley, CA November 2011
Give Mother Earth A Chance
30 Nov 2010, 11:00
“If commerce starts to undermine life support, then commerce must stop, because life has to carry on.” This is the central premise Dr Vandana Shiva’s passionate address for the 2010 City of Sydney Peace Prize Lecture, in which she lambasts global corporations for waging war against nature in the name of profits.
Shiva argues that when commonly used agricultural herbicides have names like “Round Up”, “Squadron”, “Avenge”, one can see there is war being waged against nature…and the humans are winning at the cost of their own future. To Vandana Shiva, fighting for peace for ‘Mother Earth’ is the broadest peace movement we can engage in.
She calls for a form of ‘Earth Democracy’, that re-imagines the biosphere as a citizen, that has universal rights that need protecting and defending.
Dr Vandana Shiva is speaking at the Sydney Opera House for the City of Sydney Peace Prize.
The Sydney Peace Prize was established by the Sydney Peace Foundation in 1998. Each year a prize is awarded to an organisation or individual who has made significant contributions to global peace. Previous winners include Patrick Dodson, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Mary Robinson, Arundhati Roy, Hans Blix and more.
Dr Vandana Shiva is a physicist, environmental activist, author and eco-feminist. As a physicist she trained at the University of Western Ontario and specialised in Quantum Theory. As an environmental activist she has worked for campaigns that focus on the issues of bio-piracy, genetic engineering, sustainable agriculture, intellectual property rights and biodiversity. She has written many books on environmental issues including “The Violence of Green Revolution”, “Bio-piracy: the Plunder of Nature and Knowledge”, “Water, Wars: Privatization, Pollution and Profit”, “Earth Democracy: Justice, Sustainability and Peace” and her most recent book “Soil Not Oil” released in 2008. In 1991, Shiva established “Navdanya” a food security movement based in over 16 states in India, it aims to empower farmers to protect their economic livelihoods and natural resources, especially native seeds. Shiva has been awarded several awards for her efforts including the Right Livelihood Award and the United Nations Environment Program [UNEP] Global 500 Award in 1993, and most recently the 2010 City of Sydney Peace Prize.
Vandana Shiva has been recognised for her work on the empowerment of women in developing countries, her advocacy of the human rights of small farming communities, and her scientific analysis of environmental sustainability.
Vandana is founder of the Navdanya movement and the Bija Vidyapeeth learning centre in India, recognized as a school of the future.
Sydney Peace Foundation director, Professor Stuart Rees, said Dr Shiva was an inspiring recipient of the award. “Many communities are threatened by the consequences of global warming, yet in Australia the movement to address this issue has gone to sleep,” he said. “Vandana’s presence in Sydney in November should wake them up.”
Other distinguished recipients of Australia’s only international prize for peace have included previous Nobel recipients Professor Muhammad Yunus, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, and Aboriginal leader Patrick Dodson.
Mary Kostakidis, chair of the Sydney Peace Foundation, said governments around the world sought Dr Shiva’s counsel on issues of sustainable development. “Vandana Shiva’s work highlights the fundamental connection between human rights and the protection of the environment,” Ms Kostakidis said. “She offers solutions to some of the most critical problems posed by the effects of globalisation and climate change on the poorest and most populous nations.”
As we already are feeling divisiveness of current politics and upcoming presidential elections…
As we feel into pain and complexity of people holding seeming irreconcilable values which actually harm each other, on topics like the economy, immigration and same-sex marriage…
As even people’s intentions for doing good in the world, whether through nonviolent dissent, or simple holiday shopping to provide for a family’s happiness is met with pepper spray and handcuffs…
Now more than ever we need our Mindfulness Practice.
We need the Freedom that Mindfulness invites for us — the freedom that we do not have to follow the unconscious patterns of acute reactivity. We need to remember that it is possible to notice deeply what is happening, understand it with some wisdom, treat it with some of the compassion inherent in our humanity, and move into responses and actions that are of benefit — that is, to move toward that which lessens suffering and creates happiness, not just for us as individuals, but us as a collective world.
Our Mindfulness practice, whether it is on the cushion paying attention to the emotions and thoughts that weave between the breath and bodily sensations, or whether it is in the world paying attention to our actions and behaviors which emerge from our emotions and thoughts, is always a reminder that in order to change any unhealthy or harmful patterns — in order to transform any suffering — we have to first become aware of the patterns themselves. We cannot change anything that we are not aware of. This is also true of our collective transformation into a culture that meets the needs of greater numbers of people and beings: We first have to become deeply aware of the conditions that we are living within, and then that will guide us into transforming the world into a better place to live.
On a personal level this may show up within the experience of intense emotions. Often we are driven by unconscious motivations of our emotional landscape. How often do we feel lost in the rage or the upset that sometimes arises? The powerful impact that Mindfulness brings is that the experience of being aware of the rage is not the rage itself. Being mindful of all the sensations of rage or anger is not being lost in or consumed by the fire. How often do we actually feed the experience of anger without examining what is really happening? Do you find yourself pouring fuel on the fire of rage, or even getting angry at the anger? What might be happening other than the thoughts or emotions inflaming the fuel?
If we examine closely, we will likely find that the experience of anger and rage have pleasant sensations associated with them. Pleasant sensations are always seductive. That is the nature of “pleasant.” And generally, without an awareness practice, unconscious conditioning impels our human experience to desire more pleasant sensations — without any questions asked. We begin to enjoy the sensations of feeling angry and even feed them with experiences such as self-righteousness, or a sense of “better-than,” or even revenge. The deceptive nature of the pleasant feelings of rage is that the behaviors and actions which emerge do not always lead to less suffering in the world. Much of our behavior and actions in the world are driven by the immediacy of this kind of reaction toward strong emotions or acute pain. These actions often lead to more suffering — unless there is Mindfulness.
Anger is an important barometer possibly indicating when boundaries have been crossed, or injustices have occurred or oppression has been inflicted. However, anger can also have an unconscious life of its own when it is not met with the central question of our Awareness practice, which is also a vital choice-point of Buddhist spiritual practice: Will this lead to more suffering, or will this lead to less?
Life is complicated and this is not always a clean or clear decision point. Our practice simply invites us to do the best we can — to be as mindful, aware and kind to whatever arises, even our intense emotional landscapes. The personal mantra that I have developed to navigate through the complex dilemmas and social issues arising currently is:
Can I be mindful and loving of whatever arises.
If I can’t be loving in this moment, can I be kind.
If I can’t be kind, can I be non-judgmental.
If I can’t be non-judgmental, can I not cause harm.
And if I cannot not cause harm, can I cause the least amount of harm possible?
Our awareness practice does not simply end with how it applies to our personal life. The Buddha did not design an individual practice that solely leads to personal salvation or enlightenment. The invitation of the Buddha’s teachings is to make our Mindfulness relevant and integral to not only our personal journey towards happiness, but our collective transformation towards Freedom. It is written in the Satipatthana Sutta:
The Noble Ones abide contemplating internally, they abide contemplating externally, they abide contemplating both externally and internally.
This practice of applying awareness to our internal personal experience and the external collective experience is how we create Freedom for all beings — it is how we become aware of what needs to be transformed. Referencing our current reality, to change the dynamic of the 1 percent and the 99 percent, we first need to become fully aware of the suffering and the disparities involved, and how these disparities actually cause harm to the 100 percent, not just the 99 percent. In addition, not everyone in the 99 percent is aware that that they are part of the 99 percent.
This is a process that is beginning to expand. Some of the 99 percent might have a few more creature comforts than others (i.e. “pleasant” conditions in life); however, this does not mean that they are not oppressed by a larger system in place. Our collective consciousness is in the midst of being raised. And this collective awareness raising is not separate or different from the deepening of our personal mindfulness practice, internally and externally.
What we do on the meditation cushion to create clarity of mind, openness in our hearts, and mindfulness of our thoughts, emotions and actions is not any different than the work we do in the world to create a better life for all of us. As many spiritual masters and social activist elders have told us, from Mahatma Gandhi to Audre Lorde, “We must be the change we wish to see in the world.” Mindfulness can be the practice that connects our individual spiritual path with the path of all beings. Our paths toward Freedom are the same. We are not separate from one another.
Thich Nhat Hanh writes:
When you break through to the truth, compassion springs up like a stream of water. With that compassion, you can embrace even the people who have persecuted you. When you’re motivated by desire to help those who are victims of ignorance, only then are you free from your suffering and feelings of violation. Don’t wait for things to change around you. You have to practice liberating yourself. Then you will be equipped with the power of compassion and understanding, the only kind of power that can help transform an environment full of injustice and discrimination. You have to become such a person — one who can embody tolerance, understanding, and compassion. You transform yourself into an instrument for social change and change in the collective consciousness of mankind.
Thich Nhat Hanh describes one of the meanings embedded in sati, or mindfulness, and that is the capacity to remember what will lead to freedom in our lives — remembering that our personal and collective path toward Freedom is not dependent on any external conditions. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. has spoken, “We shall overcome because the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.” In his wisdom, he prepares us that Justice, as worthy a task as it is in our lives, will take longer than any of us would like. It will require the efforts of the many rather than the few. And it will require every spiritual attribute we can muster.
There is tremendous injustice and unfairness in our cultures, our society and our world. And the teaching is that Freedom is not even dependent upon Life being fair or just. True Freedom does not mean to be in a place where there is no problem, struggle or oppression. True Freedom means to be in the midst of any and/or all those things, and have clarity in our minds, openness in our hearts and integrity in our actions. This is the kind of Freedom that will allow us to move through even our most difficult struggles with greater ease and benefit for us all.
Now more than ever, we need to remember this.
Larry Yang teaches meditation retreats nationally and has a special interest in creating access to the Dharma for diverse multicultural communities. Larry has practiced extensively in Burma and Thailand, with a six month period of ordination as a Buddhist monk under the guidance of meditation master Ajahn Tong. Larry is one of the core teachers and leaders of the East Bay Meditation Center and is on the Spirit Rock Teachers Council. He is one of the coordinating teachers of the Spirit Rock Community Dharma Leader training program.
45. 30 Reasons To Get Out Of Real Estate Part 1
46. 30 ReasonsTo Get Out Of Real Estate Part 2
47. The Shock of a New Paradigm
48. Our Great Depression
Those who live in accordance with these divine laws without complaining, firmly established in faith, are released from karma. Those who violate these laws, criticizing and complaining, are utterly deluded, and are the cause of their own suffering”
~ Bhagavad Gita
Karma and Dharma
On the pathways of Earth School that are many lessons to be learned by a soul. Among the plethora of experiences there are those of the two superior Universal Laws of Karma and Dharma that are needed to be understood in order to give us the proper knowledge in how to conduct ourselves harmoniously within the superior order of the universe.
Every action activates a reaction; good or bad there is always a consequence. There is no effect without cause or action without consequence. Every situation manifested in one’s life is an amazing opportunity for generating experience and knowledge that is an immeasurable resource for advancement of the soul, being both as a registry and expansion of consciousness, or Adhikara.
The Wheels of Dharma
Dharma is a Sanskrit word that means “Natural Law” or reality. Dharma is a basic philosophy and practice that had its origins in India and with the most remote form of Dharma being the Sanatana Dharma, meaning eternal Dharma.
In Buddhism, Jainism and Sikhism, Dharma also has an axial role. In these schools of wisdom, beings that live their lives in harmony with the Dharmic Universe can rapidly reach Moska, Dharma Yukam or Nirvana; in other words, to complete liberation in an efficient way from the Wheels of Samsara.
In Buddhist teachings, the flow of the Dharma can be compared to wheels that can travel from one country to another, according to the flow or movement of circumstances and conditions, such as the Karmic inclinations of each individual.
As a moral doctrine, Dharma presides over the duties and rights of the individual and it is usually references an activity or spiritual task. It can also refer to social order, rules of conduct, or simply virtuous living.
Dharma, as a spiritual law, is absolute in Divine Justice and may reside beyond most people’s comprehension due to their being in attachment to a finite and limited earthly reality. The “rains of purification” will keep falling until people are willing to break the Karmic cycles by healing the self.
The Divine Justice
The Dharmic Law has, at its fundamental base, the exercise of Justice (or adjustments) and Mercy. Justice without Mercy is tyranny. Mercy without Justice is complacency. The diagram of this Universal Law can be perceived through the existence of the two pillars of the Tree of Life: the Severity and Mercy, and summarized through the archetypical representation of Lady Justice’s Scale.
“The idea that the deceased could air his grievances about someone else in the hereafter, and also be called to account for his own actions, was known in Egypt from as early as the 4th Dynasty. In addition, the Pyramid Texts contain references to a judicial investigation into the king’s conduct (…) According to this concept, the instrument of justice is the weighing scales – the human heart is put into one side of the scales, after all, it knows everything about the actions of its owner, and weighed against a feather, the symbol of Maat[1]”.
The Judgment, or adjustment of the level of our consciousness, and the consequent deliberation of our new Karmic experiences, come from a council of supreme Consciousnesses completely expanded and awaken. Esoterically, this “body” of Consciousnesses is called the members of the Divine Justice Tribunal. This Tribunal has as a function the measurement of the level of awareness of each soul, weighting the activities, intentions, and effects as consequence of our actions.
On the walls of the pyramids and tombs of Egypt, there are many representations of this Divine Tribunal. Most of them present the god Anubis as the “Executive-Judge” and 42 other beings, the body of Consciousnesses previously mentioned, as the other judges. In the Egyptian pantheon, Anubis is the god with the duty to weight the hearts of the recently dead and to determine their fate.
Source: http://humanityhealing.net (http://s.tt/13JKV)
Terrorists are cowards. Whenever terror has struck in any part of the world, we have heard people say it is an act of cowardice. A coward runs away from action but harbours all negative feelings and does it surreptitiously.
This is exactly what happened to Arjuna. Arjuna was angry, upset, sad and wanted to run away. In the Bhagawad Gita, Lord Krishna said not to be a coward. So, it is an antidote to terrorism. Shri Krishna said bravery is the way – face the war when it is inevitable and do your duty.
A terrorist is stuck in his identity – he hides it, has no rationale and inflicts pain. Whereas Bhagawad Gita helps one to transcend one’s identity, encourages reason and infuses wisdom. In this sense, it could be called the antidote to terrorism.
The duty of a policeman, a soldier or a king is to be impartial for the sake of the nation, whether it is their mentors or relatives. Terrorists are never impartial. A soldier is brave and a terrorist is a coward. A soldier is protecting and preventing violence and a terrorist is inflicting pain and suffering. The Bhagawad Gita is the scripture of bravery in both realms of physical and metaphysical.
Terrorism is deeply steeped in hatred. An act without hatred is what Gita propounds. The Gita epitomizes the correct action – of righteousness, of upliftment of spirit and an action or duty that ought to be performed even in the most compelling situation.
In the last 5149 years of the existence of the Gita, there is no evidence of someone becoming a terrorist after reading it. In fact, Mahatma Gandhi wrote commentaries on the Bhagawad Gita and it was an inspiration for his non-violent movement. The Bhagawad Gita is a unique scripture which caters to the entire range of human evolution, comprising every level of this vast existence.
Gita stands for poise and equanimity and for performing one’s designated duty. Krishna does not encourage everyone to take the weapons and fight but a soldier cannot sell bananas in the market. He has to take his weapon to bring security to his people. If Bhagawad Gita is a terrorist scripture then all military academies in the world are nothing but terrorist organizations. Doesn’t this sound strange? Would the courts ban Lenin, Marx and Mao Tso-Tung, who to stay in power inflicted terror on millions?
A terrorist or a coward hides and inflicts pain on others whereas a soldier sacrifices his own life to bring security and peace to people. They both may take the gun but their intentions are poles apart.
Gita encourages reasoning and dialogue while terrorists are blind to any reasoning and are closed to any form of dialogue.
Interestingly, in any military training all over the world, the soldiers are asked to see the enemies as dangerous objects which need to be eliminated. The psychology behind indoctrination of such an idea is that when they think the enemy is a human being the soldiers are unable to raise their arms. There are many such survival tactics where the army men are desensitized.
A similar situation happened to Arjuna. Lord Krishna went step by step to deal with Arjuna’s emotions, ego, mindsets and concepts. He finally touched on the nature of his spiritual being; revealing him the highest knowledge and making him realize his eternal nature. This brought him enormous strength and then propelled him to perform his worldly duties. A doctor cannot be taken as a dacoit just because he opens up the stomach of the patient.
Krishna says, no sin begets him whose intellect is unattached and free from cravings and aversions, even if he kills the whole world. Now, the condition of an intellect free from cravings and aversions itself counters terrorism. Terrorism is done when the intellect is deeply attached and is hateful. The metaphors and the high standards of humanism exhibited in the Gita are unparalleled.
Jesus had said, “I did not come to bring peace, but a sword. For I came to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law; and a man’s enemies will be the members of his household.” In the Quran, there are many verses which talk about striking terror in the hearts of the infidels and cutting off their fingers. By these standards if you still call Gita a terrorist scripture then you have to precede such statements by Bible and Quran.
The fact is that it is not the scriptures that inflict terrorism; it is the mis-interpretation of an ignorant and stressed mind which justifies their actions quoting scriptures.
By Sri Sri Ravi Shankar
This article is to cater to the common man. This piece was written in December 2011, in the midst of a Russian court case against the Bhagawad Gita. The case ended with the Russian court rejecting the ban.
Product Information
Remember Who You Are is destined to transform the way vast numbers of people see themselves and the world – and it could not have been published at a more pivotal moment in known human history.
We live in extraordinary times, and we face the most enormous challenge to our individual and collective freedom. David Icke has been a trailblazer for more than two decades, warning of the coming global fascist/communist state that is now unfolding on the television news and in our daily experience. He was subjected to mass ridicule and called a madman – but events have proved him right, and continue to do so.
David has exposed the global network of families behind Big Banking, Big Biotech, Big Food, Big Government, Big Media and Big Pharma in book after book as his awareness has expanded – and he takes this on to still new levels of exposure in Remember Who You Are. But David goes far deeper down the rabbit hole than merely our daily experience of the ‘five senses’. He reveals the true nature of our reality where there is no ‘solidity’ or ‘physical’ – only vibrational, electrical, digital and holographic information fields that we decode into what appears to be a ‘physical world’.
David calls this the ‘Cosmic Internet’, and in this amazing work he explains how a malevolent force has ‘hacked’ into the cosmic information source via the ‘Saturn–Moon Matrix’ to feed us a false reality very similar in theme to the illusory world portrayed in the Matrix movie series. Remember Who You Are breaks massive new ground as David connects the dots between apparently unconnected people, subjects and world events like never before. Suddenly, a world of apparent complexity, mystery and bewilderment makes sense.
The key is in the title. We are enslaved because we identity ‘self’ with our body and our name, when these are only vehicles and symbols for what we really are – Infinite Awareness, Infinite Consciousness. We are imprisoned in the realms of the five senses and ‘little me’ when we are All That Is, All That Has Been and All That Ever Can Be. To breach the perceptual walls of the Saturn–Moon Matrix and bring an end to mass human enslavement, we need to awaken to our true identity. Everything, but everything, comes from this. Remember Who You Are. Remember ‘where’ you are and where you ‘come’ from. Remember.
Remember who you are, your not Effel Jurnt , your not Charlie Smith, your not your Job, your not your income bracket, your not your colour or your race; that’s what your experiencing. You are consciousness, all powerful, infinite, eternal consciousness; all it is, can be and ever will be, and when we move to that perception of self, to that self identity and recognize who we are that’s is when we can bring this house of cards down! – The Great David Icke
David Icke: Remember Who You Are 1/4
David Icke: Remember Who You Are 2/4
David Icke: Remember Who You Are 3/4
David Icke: Remember Who You Are 4/4
A leading environmentalist and social activist’s examination of the worldwide movement for social and environmental change
Paul Hawken has spent over a decade researching organizations dedicated to restoring the environment and fostering social justice. From billion-dollar nonprofits to single-person dot.causes, these groups collectively comprise the largest movement on earth, a movement that has no name, leader, or location, and that has gone largely ignored by politicians and the media. Like nature itself, it is organizing fr om the bottom up, in every city, town, and culture. and is emerging to be an extraordinary and creative expression of people’s needs worldwide.
Blessed Unrest explores the diversity of the movement, its brilliant ideas, innovative strategies, and hidden history, which date back many centuries. A culmination of Hawken’s many years of leadership in the environmental and social justice fields, it will inspire and delight any and all who despair of the world’s fate, and its conclusions will surprise even those within the movement itself. Fundamentally, it is a description of humanity’s collective genius, and the unstoppable movement to reimagine our relationship to the environment and one another.
How the largest movement in the world came into being, and why no one saw it coming. Paul Hawken has spent over a decade researching organizations dedicated to restoring the environment and fostering social justice.
From billion-dollar nonprofits to single-person dot.causes, these groups collectively comprise the largest movement on earth, a movement that has no name, leader, or location, and that has gone largely ignored by politicians and the media. Like nature itself, it is organizing from the bottom up, in every city, town, and culture. and is emerging to be an extraordinary and creative expression of people’s needs worldwide.
Paul Hawken is an environmentalist, entrepreneur, and author. His work includes starting ecological businesses, writing about the impact of commerce on living systems, and consulting with heads of state and CEOs on economic development, industrial ecology, and environmental policy.
Confucius was born in the 6th Century B.C.E. in the small state of Lu, located in the present Shantung peninsula. He lived during the Chou Dynasty at a point when the central authority of the dynasty was being challenged by the growth of increasingly powerful states attempting to challenge the power of the central government. Confucius himself was a member of what was referred to as the ju, a class of people primarily occupied with the study of writing from the earliest generations of the Chou period, the writings that become known as the ching or Classics, numbering five or six, but accruing additional numbers with the passage of time. So Confucius was essentially a scholar of his time.
Confucius can be understood in his historic context. That context is the slow disintegration of the stability and order of the political order of his day. His focus is upon a series of writings that described the harmonious ways of the generations before him and even further in the past, a time when sages, sheng, brought their wisdom to the governing of the world. For Confucius the Classics were the documentation that when sages governed, the world was ordered. This concept of order was defined largely in terms of a moral code of humaneness, the concept of jen, goodness, exercised by the sage rulers toward their subjects and in turn became the governing principle for all people in society.
The contrast between what Confucius read of the records of the ancients and his own age was stark. As a result Confucius sought to bring the ways of the ancients to his own generation. For many years he traveled from state to state, often at great personal risk, to attempt to inculcate the teachings of moral goodness to the rulers of the various states
In this endeavor he was a remarkable failure! No ruler was interested in a teaching of moral goodness. Is it any different today? What a surprise, such rulers were only interested in strategies to guarantee their own sustaining power and authority! Finally with no measurable success, Confucius retired to his home state and gathered increasing numbers of students around him, teaching the moral principles of the ancient sages. The formal biography ends with his role as a teacher, but his influence began with his role as a teacher.
And what was the nature of these teachings? He stressed the need to learn, hsüeh, to engage in study of the Classics and the ways of the ancient sages. His hope was that through these teachings the world would be brought back to a state of harmony and order and all society would live at peace. What were the underlying features of these teaching? The focus was upon the cultivation of a moral self, self defined in terms goodness, caring, compassion, altruism and benevolence. There are many specific teachings corresponding to these various ideas but when Confucius was asked by his disciples whether there was not one principle idea running through his teaching, he answered by saying that the “single thread” of his teachings could best be described by the term shu, most frequently translated as reciprocity.
The term reciprocity is central to Confucian teachings. The Chinese character is composed of two parts: one part means “to be like,” the second part means “heart” or “mind.” Taken together the character means literally “like-hearted” or “like-minded,” suggesting one shows care to another. It could be expressed by our word sympathy, but sympathy suggests condescension of attitude and that is not implied. Our word empathy, however, strikes at the quintessential meaning. So reciprocity is empathy. But Confucius himself goes on to define the term in a sentence sounding remarkably familiar to our Western ears: “Do not do to others what you would not have them do to you.” Confucian teaching is articulated in no more basic moral axiom then this statement and it remains foundational throughout the history of the Confucian tradition.
Why does it matter who Confucius was? To answer this question we need to understand that in the centuries following Confucus’ death, his teaching rose to a position of greater and greater prominence in two spheres. Confucian teachings became the official ideology of the Chinese state, a position it held with virtually no break until into the 20th century. On the individual level, Confucian teachings became the central focus of individual learning and moral cultivation, the goal to become a moral person modeled upon the sages of antiquity.
And this aspect of Confucian teachings lasted not only into the 20th century but to our own day and presumably into the future. Historically we also witness the spread of Confucian teaching at both levels from China to both Korea and Japan and into South East Asia as well. The entire East Asian and South East Asia spheres have been dominated by Confucian values through out their history. To understand the thought and values of East and South East Asia, particularly in our own day, we simply must understand the teachings of this man Confucius.
But it goes further: to understand why Confucian teachings addressed not only the ideology of the state, but found their true focus upon the learning of the self to create a moral self, we must understand this man Confucius. Why? Is it important to create a moral self in a world not unlike the chaos of the world Confucius himself faced? Are we so very different? Have we travelled so very far from that fundamental necessity of finding the single thread of reciprocity and living by its virtue? Perhaps we all need to return to the simple teachings of Confucius to reacquaint ourselves with the simplest principles of living as a moral person and thereby creating a moral world. The message of Confucius is nothing more than the call to each person to fulfill his or her capacity of goodness, jen, and thereby, one by one, transform the world from what it is, to what can be and ought to be.
Dr. Rodney L. Taylor, Professor of Religious Studies at University of Colorado at Boulder for more than 30 years, received his Ph.D. from Columbia University in East Asian religion. His principle area of specialization is the understanding of Confucianism as a religious tradition both historically and in the modern world where Confucianism can be a voice in the contemporary discussion of religion and spirituality.
His books include: The Religious Dimensions of Confucianism; The Way of Heaven; The Confucian Way of Contemplation; The Illustrated Encyclopedia of Confucianism; Confucianism (high school text); The Cultivation of Sagehood as a Religious Goal in Neo-Confucianism; They Shall Not Hurt: Human Suffering and Human Caring (with Dr. Jean Watson); The Holy Book in Comparative Perspective (with Dr. Frederick Denny) and his most recent volume, Confucius, the Analects: The Path of the Sage from Skylight Paths.
Twenty-six centuries after their origination, the principles laid down in the Analects of Confucius still act as the foundation of Chinese philosophy, ethics, society and government, and play a formative role in the development of many Eastern philosophies. In this intriguing look at the ethical and spiritual meaning of the Analects, Rodney L. Taylor, the foremost American researcher of Confucius as a religious and spiritual figure, explains their profound and universal wisdom for our own time. He shows how Confucius advocates learning and self-cultivation to follow the “path of the sage” or “Way of Heaven,” a journey that promises to promote reason, peace and understanding.
Alongside an updated version of the classic translation by Sinologist James Legge, Taylor provides informative and accessible commentary that illuminates the meaning behind selected passages from the Analects and their insights on character development, respect and reverence, and the nature of learning, goodness, truthfulness and righteousness.
