gregkavarnos wrote:I did not say misunderstand, I said misinterpret.
Of course you did as that would make me the active misinterpreting one and you the passive misunderstood one. Anyway, semantics.
Please tell me where I brought up your relations with other people other than your relations with people on this forum, which is public and thus on-topic to what we were discussing. Not on-topic in this thread as a whole.Your apparent lack of agreement is based on your misinterpretation ie you are arguing with yourself. Lot's of people do misunderstand and misinterpret me (and lots of other people) and I constantly misunderstand and misinterpret people. This is no surprise whatsoever on a medium of communication like the internet. Now my relations with other people though, are neither of concern to you, nor of relevance to this thread, so try to keep on topic please.
Yes, but there is also such a thing as idiot's compassion.You do realise that intention plays a huge role in karmic outcome, right?
Boatman then. The story I was referring to is the one about the Buddha as a Bodhisattva where he killed the boatman to save 500 arhats as the boatman was going to kill them all. Why didn't he just overpower him and tie him so that the evildoer could become a great saint. Sometimes it doesn't work that way and that is precisly my point. We don't know the outcome so in the case of Milarepa it ended well. In another case it might not end so well.It was neither a fisherman nor a ferryman it was a "pirate" bandit.
First time you mention those words.Anyway who said anything about right and wrong? I spoke about karma vipakka.
And I say it isn't that simple as sometimes taking life preserves life as explained in the boatman story.I don't think I said that anything is clear cut, I believe I said that I would put preserving (all) life over taking life.
If Hitler was killed, 6 million Jews would still be alive. No Israel and middle eastern wars. Like I said, not as simple as you make it sound.If Angulimala was killed then would he have had the chance to become an Arhat in one lifetime?
I like how you included dog-kicking.I also did not say anywhere that I would not call the police to deal with a mass-murdering-child-molesting-gang-raping-drug-snorting-dog-kicking lunatic.
I hope so too. I hope I would too. However, if you only have two choices, letting them go with 99% chance of continuing on their merry way (unless you can change people by just one encounter) or having them lynched by a mob but thus preventing further more excessive suffering, which would you choose? It brings me back to my beginning point, namely that your example works because it was Milarepa. In any other situation it is not that simple.Would I save them from a blood thirsty lynch mob? I dunno, I certainly hope so.
Probably not.So as you can see, we are not disagreeing at any fundamental level, are we?
Still wondering whether you would accept that answer from your wife or not.
C
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