A Quote to Ponder on!

[Positive Change]

An interesting quote taken from a video I saw of late. Do share with me your thoughts on this:

"If German people, 70 years ago knew that you could be born Jewish in one lifetime and Chrisian in another, I'd like to make a point then... the Holocaust could never have happened. And in some way if now, Isrealis knew that they could be born Palestinian and vice versa, Shiites knew that they coule be reborn Sunni and vice versa then all these conflicts would stop. Basically, war is based on the premise that your enemy is somebody different, they are different than you."

[fruven]

Reincarnation is unbelievable and doesn't exist, and future lives doesn't exist and the world doesn't work in that way. If enough people think the same way you probably would be lead to thinking the same too! How would you think otherwise? What is the point? We are dull and not creative and imaginative. We are very focus of me and doesn't believe in utopia where everyone can have happiness. Also we are lacking of loving and compassion of others. Does utopia exist or is it achievable? If we discard it without any considerable thought we are subscribing to the idea that the world is a profit-loss world, it is a dog eats dog world. Read more science fiction and expand your thoughts 

[Tenzin Malgyur]

Positive change, very interesting quote. I would think that if the Germans believed in the law of cause and effect, they would not even think of causing any hurt or harm to anybody. The same would also apply to the Israelis and the Shiites. War also stems from greed for land, resources and power to control. This is most sad when so many have to suffer and die because of the greediness and discontentment of their leaders.

[dondrup]

A great quote indeed!

There will be no war or conflict if only the people living on this Planet Earth believes in the existence of past and future lives,  the Law of Cause and Effect, and that we are the cause of our own sufferings.   Indeed, the Jewish, Christians, Isrealis, Palestians, Shiites or Sunni had interchanged their identities countless times in their past lives without them ever realising this fact themselves!  Why do they have animosities in the first place if they had not created the causes for them in the past?  If they continue with the wars, hatreds, conflicts, misunderstandings, prejudices, discriminations, they are creating more causes to be in the same situations again and again.  They would deepen their negative karma each time leading to greater sufferings in the future.  This vicious cycle will not break.  How unfortunate that would be!

[vajrastorm]

A thought -provoking quote indeed, Positive Change.

Yes, if only, we all realize that in the cyclic existence that is Samsara, we can be friends in one lifetime and enemies in another. There is an interesting story(which has a similar 'message') in Liberation in the Palm of your Hand. A sage and realized master chuckled to himself as he passed a domestic scene.
   'A man was bouncing his baby boy on his lap, who had been the enemy he had killed because that guy had raped his wife. The wife begot him a son who was this enemy. At the same time, this man was eating a fish, who actually was his father, who had been a fisherman in that area before he died. Also, at the same time, he was kicking away the 'family' dog, who was trying to grab the fish-bones from him. The dog was the incarnation of his mother, who had passed away too'.

The sage chuckled at this vision and, as he went  on his way, he said to himself:"Samsara is such a farce".

If only we do not divide people into categories, labelling one category as 'friends' , another category as 'enemies' and yet another category as 'strangers'. If only, we can view all, with equanimity, as beings who , like us, want to have happiness and don't want to experience suffering, then there will be no conflict or war.

Better still, if only we can see all beings as having been our mothers before, and seek to remember and repay their kindnesses to us, how much love and kindness and peace and compassion there will be among all beings. 

[Benny]

Excellent example shared by Vajrastorm ! If only all of humanity realize and accept this fact. However , realizing and accepting may not be enough but actualizing it by putting it into practice is the difficult part.

To put this into perspective , how many of us can literally love thy enemy overnight upon such a realization? For most it is the start of a life long journey into spirituality and for some just another fact of life which simply gets "filed" away in our subconscious minds.

[buddhalovely]

War comes from knowing that the other party are dissimilar from one another and that represents the whole judgmental conduct and contradictory of unity. It's the method of 'you and I have nothing in common' towards each other that creates rough edges to their beliefs. How they label things as they are and how no one is allowed to change it because of a certain history. If they knew who they are and can turn into someone who they despise in one lifetime, who is to say they wouldn't still do it? Everyone is different and twisted in one way or another. Yes, it is logical that if you knew you would reincarnate into your own nightmare, you would automatically stop the whole point of war because it would be as if you are attacking your own circle of existence. Then again the fixations of how some people handle these kind of situations are somehow forced, and as I said again because of certain history, they are pushed into continuing their sinful actions and ignoring it's contradictory.

[Aurore]

This quote got me thinking this as well ...
If pro Dalai Lama people knew 10 years later Dorje Shugden's ban is lifted and the real truth is out and vice versa, then all these conflicts between the pro-Dalai Lama camp and pro-Shugden camp will stop.

People live in conflicts because of differences. In actuality we are all the same. Yes, definitely an excellent quote to ponder upon when people are so fixated with their views and who they are in gender, race and beliefs.

[sonamdhargey]

Thanks for the quote. The core problem here is not the indifferences but how people cannot accept and tolerate indifferences. It is all from one's thoughts that these indifferences takes place. It originated from one self and imposing them on others. Who is right or who is wrong has no meaning when in the end of the day right or wrong changes all the time.

[Positive Change]

Thanks for the quote. The core problem here is not the indifferences but how people cannot accept and tolerate indifferences. It is all from one's thoughts that these indifferences takes place. It originated from one self and imposing them on others. Who is right or who is wrong has no meaning when in the end of the day right or wrong changes all the time.

Precisely... the problem is NOT the issue at hand, in this case, the differences, but our perceptions and judgement of a situation. As Vajrastorm's story accounts, samsara is indeed a huge FARCE! We delude ourselves into thinking we are in a "problem" permanently and that if we do not solve it we cannot move on. Everything IS a problem as long as we are in samsara. Nothing works after a while, not even our bodies... let alone our mortality... so why do we hold on to what is impermanent and discard the permanent realizations that can be?

Perhaps its karma.... perhaps it is our stubborn and lazy nature to "live" in samsara with no care for the future... living no different than an animal I say... so why be human then? If we have some morsel of realization that we have indeed this incredible opportune condition to alleviate our true suffering and get out of samsara and help those who we so call love to do the same... then perhaps we are on the right track! Any diversion from this I believe will only lead us back to samsara and perhaps not as cushy as we are now even... point to ponder on me thinks!

[vajratruth]

A thought -provoking quote indeed, Positive Change.

Better still, if only we can see all beings as having been our mothers before, and seek to remember and repay their kindnesses to us, how much love and kindness and peace and compassion there will be among all beings.

We are ignorant of many things and the Lord Buddha has said that Ignorance is one of our biggest downfalls. I too did not see many things from the proper perspective until I was fortunate enough to come across the Dharma. The society we live in is forever in conflict and we are ruled by many negative elements such as fear, greed, self-interest and anger but we do not recognize it because as a habit we seldom introspect and instead project outwardly to look for an "enemy" that is the source of our woes. Meanwhile our "enemy" is doing the same thing. I doubt is there is any conflict in which the parties to the conflict cannot justify their reason to for their aggression but basically each reason comes down to a "I am right and you are wrong".

The quote is right...wars are fought because we think the enemy is an entity outside ourselves but those who think like that may fight and win wars but will never feel safe because there are always more people "outside ourselves" and so they have to keep fighting and be ready for fights. We learn the truth from the Buddha that the real enemy is actually within us. If we can see that everyone is exactly like us, and born the same way and will die the same way. And in between those two poles, we are suffer in our minds the same way. There is no one on earth who has not been stricken by grief. An Israeli  mother grieving for her dead son looks exactly like a Palestinian mother doing the same. The corpse of a dead soldier looks exactly like that of his enemy. And yet we fail to see the similarities.

Until such time when the Dharma has touched everyone to show them an alternative way of looking at themselves, at others, and at life, there will always be samsara and as long as samsara exists, there will be wars.

[hope rainbow]

This goes in line with the reality that there is no difference between me and others, only the center of experience in one case is me and in the other cases it is others.
But the experiences are the same, everyone suffers, everyone battles, everyone is agitated and is looking for safety...
Nazis are looking for safety when they engage in a holocaust.
They are looking for safety because they suffer too.
But who's safest? The victim or the perpetrator?

[diablo1974]

Its all in the 'ifs...Mayb lets not talk about war, rather we begin from two persons; with or without a relationship tag on them?  Supposedly, if its with a tag, the relationship shouldnt have much problem but it seems untrue. If people are able to appreciate the reason behind the tag every day and never forget....things get better. If people realises that we are part of humanity, we wont have war.