On Thu, Apr 12, 2018, 3:42 PM Dave Long <dave.l...@bluewin.ch> wrote:
> > Asuras and Devas are both part of the grand cosmic truth. There's > > no cosmic > > dance of life without light and darkness. > > > Along those lines, there's "The Master and Margarita"[0], in which > one of the few Asuras to have his own Rolling Stones song says: > > What would your good do if evil didn't exist, and what would the > > earth look like if all the shadows disappeared? After all, shadows > > are cast by things and people. Here is the shadow of my sword. But > > shadows also come from trees and living beings. Do you want to > > strip the earth of all trees and living things just because of your > > fantasy of enjoying naked light? > That's beautiful. :-) It's definitely an old idea, and something that one realises along the way to understanding reality. However it's not a capstone reality. Reality is, in my experience, an infinite layered cabbage, the more layers you remove the more there are. Even the Buddha cannot know the depth of the mind says one Buddhist sutra. Nevertheless, Prajñāpāramitā Hṛdaya sūtra: « There is no suffering, no cause of suffering, no end to suffering, no path to follow » Seemingly in contradiction to the first Noble truth. Where beauty is, then there is ugliness; where right is, also there is wrong. Knowledge and ignorance are interdependent; delusion and enlightenment condition each other. Since olden times it has been so. How could it be otherwise now? Wanting to get rid of one and grab the other is merely realizing a scene of stupidity. Even if you speak of the wonder of it all, how do you deal with each thing changing? -Ryokan Taigu All the same, knowing that reality is undifferentiated, we chase the path of light because humans best function as beings of light. A catfish knows land and water, but it can't live without water, though water exists atop land. So too the human, who can live in darkness, but can't thrive for too long there. Reality's dice roll is weighted in favor of virtue rather than sin, it's life's preservation algorithm. The Devi Bhagavatam proclaims The Gods get their powers from drinking the nectar of devotion, the rishis get their powers from performing Tapasya, and the asuras get their powers from wearing stones or amulets. We don't want ashuric powers. What we want has nothing to do with the outside. We want changes to take place on the inside. Anyway, reality :: cabbage is a nice image of the infiniteness of truth. Thank you Vani for bringing the spiritual element to the list. >
