Quotes: Confucious

Success depends upon previous preparation, and without such preparation there is sure to be failure.
- Confucius


The expectations of life depend upon diligence; the mechanic that would perfect his work must first sharpen his tools. 
Confucius


It does not matter how slowly you go as long as you do not stop.
Confucius


Look at the means which a man employs, consider his motives, observe his pleasures. A man simply cannot conceal himself! 
Confucius


It is more shameful to distrust our friends than to be deceived by them. 
Confucius


Virtue is not left to stand alone. He who practices it will have neighbors.
Confucius


Learning without thought is labor lost; thought without learning is perilous. 
Confucius


Ability will never catch up with the demand for it. 
Confucius
 

Wherever you go, go with all your heart. 
Confucius
 
 I want you to be everything that’s you, deep at the center of your being. 
Confucius 


Life is really simple, but we insist on making it complicated.
Confucius


An oppressive government is more to be feared than a tiger.
Confucius


The superior man acts before he speaks, and afterwards speaks according to his action. 
Confucius


Real knowledge is to know the extent of one’s ignorance.
Confucius


If we don’t know life, how can we know death?
Confucius


To know what is right and not to do it is the worst cowardice. 
Confucius
 
To go beyond is as wrong as to fall short. 
Confucius


 The firm, the enduring, the simple, and the modest are near to virtue. 
Confucius


He who learns but does not think, is lost! He who thinks but does not learn is in great danger.
 Confucius


The superior man understands what is right; the inferior man understands what will sell.
Confucius


We should feel sorrow, but not sink under its oppression.
Confucius


When anger rises, think of the consequences. 
Confucius

 
What you do not want done to yourself, do not do to others. 
Confucius


The superior man makes the difficulty to be overcome his first interest; success only comes later.
Confucius


They must often change, who would be constant in happiness or wisdom.
Confucius


Without feelings of respect, what is there to distinguish men from beasts?
Confucius


And remember, no matter where you go, there you are. 
Confucius


To see and listen to the wicked is already the beginning of wickedness.
Confucius


Never give a sword to a man who can’t dance.
Confucius


When it is obvious that the goals cannot be reached, don’t adjust the goals, adjust the action steps.
Confucius
 

 No matter how busy you may think you are, you must find time for reading, or surrender yourself to self-chosen ignorance.
Confucius


 Go before the people with your example, and be laborious in their affairs.
Confucius


Heaven means to be one with God. 
Confucius
   

Baby Krishna, The Butter Theif

Krishna the Butter Thief

 

At "Trickster Makes the World" last night, I told the story of Krishna the Butter Thief. Krishna is a Hindu Trickster and one of the avatars of Vishnu, the ordering and sustaining principle of the universe. His parents had powerful enemies, so he was given to a humble family of cowherds to raise as soon as he was born. There was deep love between Krishna and his foster mother Yasoda, who was perpetually amazed, awed, and perplexed by the precocious child god.
The family always had a lot of milk and butter around. Krishna was very fond of both. One day Yasoda had to leave the house to run some errands. She told the child Krishna to stay out of the pots of butter while she was away. But as soon as he was alone he went into the cool larder, opened the crocks one by one, and ate his fill.

When Yasoda came home she was dismayed and reprimanded him. “Krishna,” she said, “I thought I told you to stay out of the butter.” “But Mother,” he replied, “I don’t know what you’re talking about. I didn't steal any butter.” Of course his face and hands and clothes were smeared with butter —which she pointed out to him. "Explain this," she said.

“Well,” said Krishna, "Maybe I did get into the butter, but if I did so it was all your fault—the little bracelets that you gave me to wear chafed my wrists. I needed to sooth them.” At this Yasoda threw up her hands and threatened to punish him. “The next time that I leave the house I’ll simply have to tie you up,” she said, although she wondered how one does tie up a god.

Tying up Krishna could be a very good idea. If she does, the neighbors will be safe too, and Krishna has quite a reputation for going around to the nearby houses to steal butter and spill the milk and let the cows loose just before milking time. A number of people would be grateful.

The next day, Yasoda again had to leave the house. "Come Krishna" she said, and got a long rope. Yasoda wrapped the rope around Krishna but every time she tried to tie a knot, she discovered that the rope was too short. Krishna smiled and made the knot himself. Then he said, “Mother tell me this, if this is our house and we own everything in it, then how can I be stealing the butter?”

Kali

The Fearful Symmetry

Kali is represented with perhaps the fiercest features amongst all the world's deities. 

She has four arms, with a sword in one hand and the head of a demon in another. 

The other two hands bless her worshippers, and say, "fear not"! She has two dead heads for her earrings, a string of skulls as necklace, and a girdle made of human hands as her clothing. 

Her tongue protrudes from her mouth, her eyes are red, and her face and breasts are sullied with blood. 

She stands with one foot on the thigh, and another on the chest of her husband, Shiva. 

The Seven Valleys

Attar is said to have met Jalálu’d-Dín Rúmí (1207-1273 A.D.) when the latter was still a child enkindling (sp.) him with the insatiable longing for the illusive and unknowable divine essence of all things.

And I know she and I share a deep love for the Seven Valleys Haft-Vádí (1860). The Seven Valleys includes references and/or citations from Attar, Rúmí and Layla and Majnun.

According to Wikipedia, Kurdish poet Nezami (1100s?)’s famous adaptation of the story of Layla and Majnun (Leyli and Madjnun) from Arab folklore reads astonishingly like Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet.

 I believe that Layla and Majnin are to the East what Romeo and Juliet are to the West? There is even a suggestion that Eric Clapton’s song Layla was inspired by this Arab-Persian-Turkish-Kurd classic.

My Favourite citations-within-citations from Seven Valleys – Haft-Vádí (1860)

In the ocean he findeth a drop, in a drop he beholdeth the secrets of the sea.

Split the atom’s heart, and lo! Within it thou wilt find a sun.

From the Wikipedia entry on Seven Valleys – Haft-Vádí (1860)

the path of the soul on a spiritual journey passing through different stages, from this world to other realms which are closer to God,[1] as first described by the 12th Century Sufi poet Attar in his Conference of the Birds. Bahá’u'lláh in the work explains the meanings and the significance of the seven stages. In the introduction, Bahá’u'lláh says “Some have called these Seven Valleys, and others, Seven Cities.” The stages are accomplished in order, and the goal of the journey is to follow “the Right Path”, “abandon the drop of life and come to the sea of the Life-Bestower”, and “gaze on the Beloved”.

 Source: http://oceanflynn.wordpress.com/2006/10/24/30/

"The Concourse of the Birds"

The poetic text of 'Attar’s Mantiq al‑Tair comprises a series of parables narrated by the hoopoe, who leads a gathering of birds on a difficult journey to find the mythic Simurgh. Perhaps the best‑known image from the manuscript, this folio illustrates the small, crested hoopoe bird addressing his companions before their departure. This charming painting is one of four added to the original manuscript in the early seventeenth century at the court of Shah 'Abbas (r. 1587–1629), and is signed by the painter Habiballah.

"The Concourse of the Birds", Folio from a Mantiq al-tair (Language of the Birds)

Painting by Habiballah of Sava  (active ca. 1590–1610)

The Concourse of the Birds painted by Habib Allah. The hoopoe, center right, instructs the other birds on the Sufi path.


  Hoopoe

The Conference of the Birds (Persian: منطق الطیر‎, Mantiqu 't-Tayr, 1177) is a book of poems in Persian by Farid ud-Din Attar of approximately 4500 lines.

In the poem, the birds of the world gather to decide who is to be their king, as they have none. The hoopoe, the wisest of them all, suggests that they should find the legendary Simorgh, a mythical Persian bird roughly equivalent to the western Phoenix. 
 
The hoopoe leads the birds, each of whom represent a human fault which prevents man from attaining enlightenment. When the group of thirty birds finally reach the dwelling place of the Simorgh, all they find is a lake in which they see their own reflection.

Besides being one of the most celebrated examples of Persian poetry, this book relies on a clever word play between the words Simorgh – a mysterious bird in Iranian mythology which is a symbol often found in sufi literature, and similar to the Phoenix bird – and "si morgh" – meaning "thirty birds" in Persian.

It was in China, late one moonless night,

The Simorgh first appeared to mortal sight –

He let a feather float down through the air,

And rumours of its fame spread everywhere; ^[1]

Its most famous section is:

Come you lost Atoms to your Centre draw,

And be the Eternal Mirror that you saw:

Rays that have wander'd into Darkness wide

Return and back into your Sun subside

The story recounts the longing of a group of birds who desire to know the great Simorgh, and who, under the guidance of a leader bird, start their journey toward the land of Simorgh. 
One by one, they drop out of the journey, each offering an excuse and unable to endure the journey. 

Each bird has a special significance, and a corresponding didactic fault. The guiding bird is the hoopoe, while the nightingale symbolizes the lover. The parrot is seeking the fountain of immortality, not God and the peacock symbolizes the "fallen soul" who is in alliance with Satan.

The birds must cross seven valleys in order to find the Simorgh: Talab (Yearning), Eshq (Love), Marifat (Gnosis), Istighnah (Detachment), Tawheed (Unity of God), Hayrat (Bewilderment) and, finally, Fuqur and Fana (Selflessness and Oblivion in God). 

These represent the stations that a Sufi or any individual must pass through to realize the true nature of God.

Within the larger context of the story of the journey of the birds, Attar masterfully tells the reader many didactic short, sweet stories in captivating poetic style. 

Eventually only thirty birds remain as they finally arrive in the land of Simorgh – all they see there are each other and the reflection of the thirty birds in a lake – not the mythical Simorgh. 

It is the Sufi doctrine that God is not external or separate from the universe, rather is the totality of existence. 

The thirty birds seeking the Simorgh realise that Simorgh is nothing more than their transcendent totality. 

The idea of God within is an idea intrinsic to most interpretations of Sufism. 

As the birds realize the truth, they now reach the station of Baqa (Subsistence) which sits atop the Mountain Qaf.



For more information go to:
 http://sufibooks.info/Sufism/The_Conference_of_the_Birds_Fardiuddin_Attar.pdf


 

 This image of this painting by Habib Allah (c.1600) “The Concourse of the Birds” is available from the Wikimedia Commons. The original is in the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

This is an illustration of the Persian mystic, Faridu’ud-Din Attar’s allegory (c.1100?) “The Conference of the Birds” which I believe is also called Mantiqu’t-Tayr Language of the Birds.

This work may have inspired   “Journey to the East” by
Herman Hesse.

It describes the seeker’s parallel journey to self-discovery, self-actualization, self-realization through the elusive search for God.

 

buddhist Images and Art

 

 

 

 

 

Source:

http://www.dhammawheel.com/viewtopic.php?f=13&t=110&start=1080

http://greatmiddleway.wordpress.com/page/4/

Buddhist Images

 

 

 

Contentment with whatever little one has!

 

 

 

The blessed Buddha once said:

Mind precedes and initiates all phenomena!
Mind is their chief, mind is their maker...
When one speaks or performs an action
with a mind, that is internally all pure,
then happiness and pleasure follows,
like a shadow that never departs...
Dhammapada 1

 

 

 

The over 2000 years old Bodhi Tree in Ceylon.

On such Full-Moon Uposatha Poya Observance days:
Any Lay Buddhist simply joins the Three Refuges & undertakes the
Five Precepts like this: Newly bathed, shaved, white-clothed, with
clean bare feet, one kneels at a shrine with a Buddha-statue, and
bows first three times, so that feet, hands, elbows, knees & head
touch the floor. Then, with joined palms at the heart, one recites
these memorized lines in a loud, calm & steady voice:

As long as this life lasts:
I hereby take refuge in the Buddha.
I hereby take refuge in the Dhamma.
I hereby take refuge in the Sangha.
I hereby seek shelter in the Buddha for the 2nd time.
I hereby seek shelter in the Dhamma for the 2nd time.
I hereby seek shelter in the Sangha for the 2nd time.
I hereby request protection from the Buddha for the 3rd time.
I hereby request protection from the Dhamma for the 3rd time.
I hereby request protection from the Sangha for the 3rd time.
I will hereby respect these Three Jewels the rest of my life!

I accept to respect & undertake these 5 training rules:
I hereby accept the training rule of avoiding all Killing.
I hereby accept the training rule of avoiding all Stealing.
I hereby accept the training rule of avoiding all Sexual Abuse.
I hereby accept the training rule of avoiding all Dishonesty.
I hereby accept the training rule of avoiding all Alcohol & Drugs.
As long as this life lasts, I am thus protected by these 5 precepts...

I am a friend and helper to all,
I am sympathetic to all living beings.
I develop a mind full of love and
delights always in harmlessness.
I gladden my mind, fill it with joy,
makes it immovable and unshakable.
I develop the divine states of mind
not cultivated by simple men.
Theragatha. 648-9

 

Divorced from Possessiveness, Egoism, Clinging and Frustration!

 

 

How can one ever Succeed, when Never having Started?



The Blessed Buddha once said:
Bhikkhus, those who have neglected to begin this Noble 8-fold Way,
have failed to develop the Noble Method, which destroys Suffering!
While those who having indeed begun this Noble 8-fold Way, have
indeed also initiated the Noble Method, which destroys all Suffering!
And what, Bhikkhus, is this Noble 8-fold Way? It is simply this:

1: Right View (samma-ditthi)
2: Right Motivation  (samma-sankappa)
3: Right Speech  (samma-vaca)
4: Right Action  (samma-kammanta)
5: Right Livelihood  (samma-ajiva)
6: Right Effort  (samma-vayama)
7: Right Awareness  (samma-sati)
8: Right Concentration  (samma-samadhi)

Bhikkhus, those who have failed even to start on this Noble 8-fold Way,
have failed to cultivate that Noble Method, which destroys all Suffering!
While those, who have really started on this Noble 8-fold Way, have
indeed also made the first move capable of destroying all Suffering!