Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Ron Krumpos on March 19, 2010 at 12:20pm

A few quotes on Love from "the greatest achievement in life," my e-book at www.suprarational.org (pardon the plug):

“Love your neighbor like something which you yourself are. For all souls are one. Each is a spark from the original soul and this soul is wholly inherent in all souls, just as your soul is in all members of your body.” Shmelke of Nikolsburg J
[Note: (d. 1778) Moravian rabbi.]

“At the goal, the soul is filled with and enveloped in the love of God. It is indistinguishable from God...all thought of lover, love and the beloved is absent.” Swami S(h)ivananda H

“All that is not One must ever suffer with the wound of Absence, and whoever in Love’s city enters, finds but room for One and, but in Oneness, Union.” Jami I

[on the diversity of religions] “The lamp is different, but the light is the same. Love alone can end their quarrel. Love alone comes to the rescue when you cry for help against their arguments.” Rumi [Mawlana] I

“Meditate on the divinity within yourself. Drink the nectar of love that continually pours from the heart of God.” Lalla H
[Note: She was the 14th-century prophetess of Kashmir.]

“Spiritual love is different. ...it leads to unity with the beloved. This unity in love remains forever and ever, always alive, both within and without, and each moment you live in love. It will swallow you completely until there is no ‘you.’ There is only love.” Amritanandamayi Ma [Amma(chi)] H [Note: 20th-21st-century saint; she is called the “hugging saint.”]

Permalink Reply by Maynard on March 19, 2010 at 12:25pm

"the states of this love are innocence, peace, tranquillity, inmost friendship, full confidence, and a mutual desire of animus and heart to do to the other every good"

--Emanuel Swedenborg, "Conjugial Love" #180
http://www.smallcanonsearch.com/read.php?book=ml&section=180

"because innocence and peace are predicated of the soul, tranquillity of the mind, inmost friendship of the breast, full confidence of the heart, and the mutual desire of animus and heart to do to the other every good, of the body from these."

Permalink Reply by Anand Krishna on March 19, 2010 at 12:52pm

Ron, Maynard, thank you very much. Love

Permalink Reply by Rajendra Shelke on March 19, 2010 at 3:46pm

Gandhi in Virginia Tech

Perhaps, Cho Seung Hui was annoyed with his colleagues in Virginia Tech. His feeling was so intense that he gunned down 30 innocent people in Norris Hall after pumping a minimum of three bullets in each victim’s body. He did not forget to chain shut a door to the building from the inside before he fired more than 100 bullets at them within a half an hour. He was on mission to take revenge. Everybody was his enemy. It was a naked display of vengeance.

Exactly one week after the massacre, on the day classes resumed at Virginia Tech thousands of students & faculty gathered in the center of the campus to pay solemn tribute to the victims of the massacre. An antique 850-pound brass bell installed on a limestone rostrum tolled soothingly giving moral & emotional strength to thousands of grief-stricken students & faculty. Thirty three white balloons were released into the air in the memory of 32 victims and the gunman, Cho Seung Hui. On the campus lawn rose a semi-circle of 33 chunks of locally quarried limestone to remember each of the dead. Someone lighted a purple candle at Cho’s stone, along with a soliloquy in laminated letters:

“Cho, you greatly underestimated our strength, courage and compassion. You have broken our hearts, but you have not broken our spirits. We are stronger and prouder than ever. Erin J.”

The unspoken mind reflections of the writer, Erin J., were manifested in these laminated letters. For Erin J., Cho who killed 32 innocent people ruthlessly was not an enemy. He not merely had a certain attitude of detached sympathy towards Cho, but also was denying the very existence of an enemy. It was the complete denial of the vengeance. The evil was not met with evil but with good. In Virginia Tech campus, consciously or unconsciously Gandhi’s doctrine of non-violence has been used to meet with the violence. Gandhi was made alive in campus by the organizers. Perhaps Gandhi smiled on that day, because someone has used his doctrine of non-violence after a long lull since 1960 when a charismatic civil rights leader Martin Luther King used it in a campaign against the segregation of Blacks.

The word non-violence literally means non-injury, or, more narrowly, non-killing, and, more widely, harmlessness, the renunciation of the will to kill and of the intention to hurt any living thing, abstention from hostile thought, word and act. Gandhi linked his concept of non-violence to the idea of non-attachment and freedom from hatred, pride and anger. Gandhi declared that the complete non-violence is complete absence of ill-will, that active non-violence is goodwill towards all life that non-violence in this sense is a perfect state and the goal toward which mankind moves naturally though unconsciously.

Total non-violence is a state of soul and mind. It may ultimately be identical with divine love, the sense of oneness with all, that belongs to the great prophets and mystics. But in its immediate and daily application it must be distinguished from the feeling of love and from benevolence as well as from the mere hatred of violence. Gandhi wanted the acceptance of non-violence to imply a deliberate stand against ill-will, a method of action based upon self-restraint. Non-violence is not a resignation from all real fighting against wickedness, but a more active fight against wickedness than retaliation which, by its very nature increases wickedness. Non-violence, as Gandhi saw it, actually presupposes the ability to strike. Besides, it is a conscious & deliberate restraint put upon one’s desire for vengeance. Non-violence is intended and expected to convert rather than coerce the wrong-doer, however slightly and slowly. Another important ingredient in non-violence is the notion of “self-suffering”, a refusal to submit to injustice, and acceptance of personal discomfort and tribulations.

Non-violence is important not just as a desirable virtue or merely as the means for the purification and ennobling of the soul but even more as the fundamental and perhaps the only way in which we can express our respect for the innate worth of any human being. It is essential and universal obligation without which we would cease to be human.

Permalink Reply by Anand Krishna on March 19, 2010 at 7:00pm

Wonderful Rajendraji, thanks, namaste

Rajendra Shelke said:

Gandhi in Virginia Tech

Perhaps, Cho Seung Hui was annoyed with his colleagues in Virginia Tech. His feeling was so intense that he gunned down 30 innocent people in Norris Hall after pumping a minimum of three bullets in each victim’s body. He did not forget to chain shut a door to the building from the inside before he fired more than 100 bullets at them within a half an hour. He was on mission to take revenge. Everybody was his enemy. It was a naked display of vengeance.

Exactly one week after the massacre, on the day classes resumed at Virginia Tech thousands of students & faculty gathered in the center of the campus to pay solemn tribute to the victims of the massacre. An antique 850-pound brass bell installed on a limestone rostrum tolled soothingly giving moral & emotional strength to thousands of grief-stricken students & faculty. Thirty three white balloons were released into the air in the memory of 32 victims and the gunman, Cho Seung Hui. On the campus lawn rose a semi-circle of 33 chunks of locally quarried limestone to remember each of the dead. Someone lighted a purple candle at Cho’s stone, along with a soliloquy in laminated letters:

“Cho, you greatly underestimated our strength, courage and compassion. You have broken our hearts, but you have not broken our spirits. We are stronger and prouder than ever. Erin J.”

The unspoken mind reflections of the writer, Erin J., were manifested in these laminated letters. For Erin J., Cho who killed 32 innocent people ruthlessly was not an enemy. He not merely had a certain attitude of detached sympathy towards Cho, but also was denying the very existence of an enemy. It was the complete denial of the vengeance. The evil was not met with evil but with good. In Virginia Tech campus, consciously or unconsciously Gandhi’s doctrine of non-violence has been used to meet with the violence. Gandhi was made alive in campus by the organizers. Perhaps Gandhi smiled on that day, because someone has used his doctrine of non-violence after a long lull since 1960 when a charismatic civil rights leader Martin Luther King used it in a campaign against the segregation of Blacks.

The word non-violence literally means non-injury, or, more narrowly, non-killing, and, more widely, harmlessness, the renunciation of the will to kill and of the intention to hurt any living thing, abstention from hostile thought, word and act. Gandhi linked his concept of non-violence to the idea of non-attachment and freedom from hatred, pride and anger. Gandhi declared that the complete non-violence is complete absence of ill-will, that active non-violence is goodwill towards all life that non-violence in this sense is a perfect state and the goal toward which mankind moves naturally though unconsciously.

Total non-violence is a state of soul and mind. It may ultimately be identical with divine love, the sense of oneness with all, that belongs to the great prophets and mystics. But in its immediate and daily application it must be distinguished from the feeling of love and from benevolence as well as from the mere hatred of violence. Gandhi wanted the acceptance of non-violence to imply a deliberate stand against ill-will, a method of action based upon self-restraint. Non-violence is not a resignation from all real fighting against wickedness, but a more active fight against wickedness than retaliation which, by its very nature increases wickedness. Non-violence, as Gandhi saw it, actually presupposes the ability to strike. Besides, it is a conscious & deliberate restraint put upon one’s desire for vengeance. Non-violence is intended and expected to convert rather than coerce the wrong-doer, however slightly and slowly. Another important ingredient in non-violence is the notion of “self-suffering”, a refusal to submit to injustice, and acceptance of personal discomfort and tribulations.

Non-violence is important not just as a desirable virtue or merely as the means for the purification and ennobling of the soul but even more as the fundamental and perhaps the only way in which we can express our respect for the innate worth of any human being. It is essential and universal obligation without which we would cease to be human.

Permalink Reply by Nugroho Angkasa on March 19, 2010 at 10:34pm

The Tea Cup Story: Letting life shape us

You will never look at a tea cup the same way again after you read this story:

A couple who took a trip and were shopping in a beautiful antique store to celebrate their wedding anniversary. They both liked antiques and pottery, and especially tea cups. Spotting an exceptional cup, they asked "May we see that? We've never seen a cup quite so beautiful."

As the lady handed it to them, suddenly the tea cup spoke, "You don't understand. I have not always been a tea cup. There was a time when I was just a lump of red clay. My master took me and rolled me, pounded and patted me over and over and I yelled out, "Don't do that."

"I don't like it!" "Let me alone," but he only smiled, and gently said; "Not yet!"

Then WHAM! I was placed on a spinning wheel and suddenly I was spun around and around and around. "Stop it! I'm getting so dizzy! I'm going to be sick!" I screamed. But the master only nodded and said, quietly; "Not yet."

He spun me and poked and prodded and bent me out of shape to suit himself and then he put me in the oven. I never felt such heat. I yelled and knocked and pounded at the door. "Help! Get me out of here!" I could see him through the opening and I could read his lips as he shook his head from side to side, "Not yet".

When I thought I couldn't bear it another minute, the door opened. He carefully took me out and put me on the shelf, and I began to cool. Oh, that felt so good! "Ah, this is much better," I thought.

But, after I cooled he picked me up and he brushed and painted me all over. The fumes were horrible. I thought I would gag. "Oh, please, Stop it, Stop!", I cried. He only shook his head and said. "Not yet!"

Then suddenly he put me back in to the oven. Only it was not like the first one. This was twice as hot and I just knew I would suffocate. I begged. I pleaded. I screamed. I cried. I was convinced I would never make it. I was ready to give up. Just then the door opened and he took me out and again placed me on the shelf, where I cooled and waited and waited, wondering "What's he going to do to me next?"

An hour later he handed me a mirror and said 'Look at yourself.' And I did. I said, "That's not me; that couldn't be me. It's beautiful. I'm beautiful!!"

Quietly he spoke: 'I want you to remember, then,' he said, "I know it hurt to be rolled and pounded and patted, but had I just left you alone, you'd have dried up. I know it made you dizzy to spin around on the wheel, but if I had stopped, you would have crumbled.

I know it hurt and it was hot and disagreeable in the oven, but if I hadn't put you there, you would have cracked. I know the fumes were bad when I brushed and painted you all over, but if I hadn't done that, you never would have hardened. You would not have had any color in your life.

If I hadn't put you back in that second oven, you wouldn't have survived for long because the hardness would not have held. Now you are a finished product. Now you are what I had in mind when I first began with you."

Source: http://www.inspiredtoreality.com/2006/04/09/the-tea-cup-story/

Permalink Reply by Anand Krishna on March 20, 2010 at 7:15pm

Thanks Nugroho, would love to have others comment as well, love

Permalink Reply by Ron Krumpos on March 21, 2010 at 8:43pm

Love, knowledge and...

Seekers of spiritual knowledge might ask, “What’s love got to do with it?” Devotees of devotion reply, “Divine love is everything.” In mystical “marriage,” divine union, you can’t have one without the other. Divine Love and divine Truth are One in divine Reality.

In Sufism of Islam, knowledge is the key which opens the lock of love. Ma`rifa, spiritual knowledge, is essential to properly guide those who are intoxicated with mahabba, love for the divine. They are two of the last stations on the mystical path. Sufism often uses exquisite poetry to convey our longing for the divine. Some of the verses were considered too erotic by orthodox Muslim clerics. Sufis say that they are just allegories to express the inexpressible.

In Hinduism, bhakti is our devotion in love and adoration of the divine. Jnana is knowledge of the way to approach the divine. Both are considered paths to realize divine union and to be released from samsara, the cycle of birth and rebirth. The way of devotion is the preferred path of most Hindu movements, as in many orthodox religions; the way of knowledge is emphasized in Vedanta; preferred and emphasized, perhaps, but they are not mutually exclusive.

The “Song of Songs” (Song of Solomon) in the Hebrew Bible, or Old Testament, are a series of love poems which may appear to be secular. Both Jewish and Christian mystics, however, interpret them as love of God for his people. The “mystical marriage” is mentioned frequently in the Kabbalah of Judaism and by Christian mystics, although the latter often allude to love between Jesus and his faithful. Divine union is the joining of the lover and beloved; it is also the unity of knower and known. Love and knowledge are coequal and complementary.

All Buddhists are devoted to the Buddha; many may also worship bodhisattvas and celestial gods or goddesses. They do not “love the divine” in the common, theistic sense, but that which is found in highest spiritual experience. Sanskrit prajna, the direct awareness of sunyata, emptiness of self, is the perfect wisdom. Love is usually expressed as loving kindness, universal love for all beings...a concept and virtue shared by the traditions of mysticism in all religions.

This life’s mortal loves, mundane truths and worldly realities are finite and transient. In the divine One, endless Love, absolute Truth and ultimate Reality are infinite and eternal.

(quoted from "the greatest achievement in life," my e-book at www.suprarational.org )

Permalink Reply by Nugroho Angkasa on March 21, 2010 at 8:44pm

Many Thanks Sir, Love n Gratitude...

Anand Krishna said:

Thanks Nugroho, would love to have others comment as well, love

Permalink Reply by Rajendra Shelke on March 30, 2010 at 3:17am

Anandji, Namaste!

I have forgotten to cite the source of my story entitled "Gandhi in Virginia Tech" . In fact, I have written this story when that unfortunate incident had happened in the campus of Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University (Virginia Tech) in Blacksburg, Virginia, United States on Monday, April 16, 2007. I did not send that story for publication as I wanted to write more on the message that the story gives to us. ( I am afraid that the present form still requires lot of modifications.)

Therefore I can mention that source of the story is "Unpublished work of Rajendra Shelke".
Regards
Rajendra Shelke

Permalink Reply by Anand Krishna on March 31, 2010 at 3:42am

Thanks Rajendraji, namaste

Rajendra Shelke said:

Anandji, Namaste!

I have forgotten to cite the source of my story entitled "Gandhi in Virginia Tech" . In fact, I have written this story when that unfortunate incident had happened in the campus of Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University (Virginia Tech) in Blacksburg, Virginia, United States on Monday, April 16, 2007. I did not send that story for publication as I wanted to write more on the message that the story gives to us. ( I am afraid that the present form still requires lot of modifications.)

Therefore I can mention that source of the story is "Unpublished work of Rajendra Shelke".
Regards
Rajendra Shelke

Permalink Reply by Claudia on April 14, 2010 at 4:14am

The God of universal love unfailingly manifests himself to every one of his creatures up to the fullness of that creature’s capacity to spiritually grasp the qualities of divine truth, beauty, and goodness.
Paper #1 The Urantia Book

http://www.urantia.org/en/urantia-book/read