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<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:left;line-height:150%"><font face="georgia, serif">Good Morning Visionaries:</font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:left;line-height:150%"><font face="georgia, serif"> For those who do not get the Daily News, appended below is my biweekly column, slightly expanded. An even longer version is attached.</font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:left;line-height:150%"><font face="georgia, serif"> Trying to stay away from the election, but I think I do have to write a column "The Tale of Two Foundations." Trump says that people "paid to play" for Clinton; but, if you heard the NPR's Fresh Air yesterday, it is obvious that Trump had others "pay so that he could play." </font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:left;line-height:150%"><font face="georgia, serif"> The investigator found one 6-foot portrait of himself (his Foundation paid $20,000 for it) in one of his Florida resorts (not in the Foundation office where it would be legit). The other $10,000 portrait and T-Bows football helmet have to be located.</font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:left;line-height:150%"><font face="georgia, serif"> Here's hoping that Clinton nails him even better in the next debate.</font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:left;line-height:150%"><font face="georgia, serif"> nfg</font></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:left;line-height:150%"><font face="georgia, serif"><br></font></p><p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center;line-height:150%"><b><font face="georgia, serif">Gandhi, the Buddha, and Pragmatic <a name="_GoBack"></a>Non-Violence:<span></span></font></b></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center;line-height:150%"><b><span style="font-family:georgia,serif">A Tribute to the Mahatma on his 145<sup>th</sup>
Birthday</span></b><br></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="text-align:center;line-height:150%"><br></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="margin:0in 0.5in 0.0001pt;text-align:center;line-height:150%"><i><span style="font-family:georgia,serif">I felt I was in the presence of a noble soul, a true
disciple of Lord Buddha,<br clear="all">
and a true believer in peace and harmony among all men.<span></span></span></i></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="margin:0in 0.5in 0.0001pt;text-align:center;line-height:150%"><span style="font-family:georgia,serif">—The Dalai Lama<span></span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="margin:0in 0.5in 0.0001pt;text-align:center;line-height:150%"><i><span style="font-family:georgia,serif">Gandhi is the greatest Indian since Gautama Buddha and the
greatest man since Jesus Christ.<span></span></span></i></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" align="center" style="margin:0in 0.5in 0.0001pt;text-align:center;line-height:150%"><span style="font-family:georgia,serif">—Unitarian
minister J. H. Holmes<span></span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent:0.5in;line-height:150%"><span style="font-family:georgia,serif">I wish to celebrate Gandhi’s 145<sup>th</sup>
Birthday on October 2 by comparing his ethics of non-violence with the Buddha,
whom Gandhi called the “greatest teacher of non-violence.”<span></span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent:0.5in;line-height:150%"><span style="font-family:georgia,serif">When I began my research on Gandhi during
my 1992 sabbatical to India, I fully expected that I would interpret his philosophy
from a Hindu or Jain perspective. Gandhi claimed that he learned much from the
pacifist Jain monks in his home state of Gujarat, but he eventually broke with them
over their belief that the rule of non-violence was absolute.<span></span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent:0.5in;line-height:150%"><span style="font-family:georgia,serif">When I closely examined Gandhi’s doctrine
of non-violence, I was compelled to interpret him in Buddhist terms. Given the
two major schools of Buddhism—the Theravada of Southeast Asia and the Mahayana
of Tibet, China, and Japan—Gandhi is closest to the Bodhisattva ideal of the latter.<span></span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent:0.5in;line-height:150%"><span style="font-family:georgia,serif">In the Theravada Buddhist laypeople gain
merit making offerings to monks and their monasteries, but in the
Mayahana—literally “The Great Vehicle’—extraordinary laypeople can become
Bodhisattvas and lead all beings to salvation. The spiritual transformation of
the entire world is the goal of Mahayana Buddhism.</span></p></div>
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<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent:0.5in;line-height:150%"><span style="font-family:georgia,serif">Gandhi actually allowed many exceptions
to his vow of non-violence, based on very realistic and pragmatic
considerations. Throughout October 1928, Gandhi carried on a lively debate
with various respondents in his journal <i>Young India</i>. Gandhi defended his
decision to euthanize an incurable calf, and even went on to list the
conditions for human euthanasia. He also thought that tigers, snakes, and
rabid dogs might have to be killed if they threaten human life. Both Hindus and
Jain were scandalized by these thoughts.</span></p></div>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent:0.5in;line-height:150%"><span style="font-family:georgia,serif">If a man who runs amuck and threatens to
kill others, Gandhi insists that he must killed; furthermore, the killer should
“be regarded a benevolent man.” Gandhi once told a Jain friend that non-violence
was not absolute and that one should always be “capable of sacrificing
nonviolence for the sake of truth.” <span></span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent:0.5in;line-height:150%"><span style="font-family:georgia,serif">Once a group of men came to Gandhi
because their village had been looted by bandits and their wives had been
raped. They said that they had followed his doctrine of non-violence, but they now
despaired about why it did not work. </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent:0.5in;line-height:150%"><span style="font-family:georgia,serif">Gandhi condemned the men as cowards,
because in this case the virtue of courage preempted the virtue of
non-violence. Passive resistance in the face of great danger is sometimes not the
right action, and “protective force,” an apt phrase from Marshall Rosenberg, may
be necessary. Early in his career Gandhi supported the British in the Boer War
and in World War I.<span></span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent:0.5in;line-height:150%"><span style="font-family:georgia,serif">In some Mahayana schools Bodhisattvas may
kill persons who will, if not stopped, murder others in the future. These Buddhists
defend such “preemptive strikes” with this reasoning: many lives would be saved
and the murderers would be saved from the horrors of Hell. (Yes, many Buddhists
believe in Hell.) Unfortunately, Tibetan Buddhists used this argument to wage
war against Buddhist sects they thought were heretical and therefore a danger
to the future of Buddhism.<span></span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent:0.5in;line-height:150%"><span style="font-family:georgia,serif">The vow of all Bodhisattvas is that, even
though they have no karmic debt, they will stand at the door of Nirvana until
all sentient beings have passed before them. The Bodhisattva also declares that
“I, for the good of all creatures, would experience all pain and unhappiness in
my own body,” a significant parallel to the Passion of Christ. <span></span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent:0.5in;line-height:150%"><span style="font-family:georgia,serif">Gandhi amazed his disciples and bedeviled
his opponents by doing their penance for them. He called it “self suffering”
for the sake of others and the “good of all.” He underwent many long fasts
vowing not to eat until his disciples reached an acceptable level of spiritual
development, or until Hindus and Muslims stopped fighting each other, or until
the British gave Indians their independence.<span></span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent:0.5in;line-height:150%"><span style="font-family:georgia,serif">Because of this, Indian writer Ramjee
Singh called Gandhi “the Bodhisattva of the twentieth century.” We should not,
however, press this comparison too far. Not even his most ardent followers have
claimed that Gandhi was sinless or had the redemptive powers of a savior. Gandhi
most definitely did not claim to have taken away the sins of the world as
Buddhist and Christians claim their saviors do.<span></span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent:0.5in;line-height:150%"><span style="font-family:georgia,serif">Nick Gier taught philosophy and religion
at the University of Idaho for 31 years. Read excerpts from this book <i>The Virtue of Non-Violence: From Gautama to
Gandhi</i> at <a href="http://webpages.uidaho.edu/ngier/VNV.htm">webpages.uidaho.edu/ngier/VNV.htm</a>.<span></span></span></p><div><br></div>-- <br><div class="gmail_signature"><div dir="ltr"><div> <div style="height:auto;width:auto"> <div> <div><div><br></div></div></div></div></div><div><div><div><div><div><div><div><font size="2"><span style="font-size:10pt"><div><span style="font-size:13.3333px">A society grows great when old men plant trees whose shade they know they shall never sit in. </span><br style="font-size:13.3333px"><br style="font-size:13.3333px"><span style="font-size:13.3333px">-Greek proverb</span></div><div><br>
“Enlightenment is man’s emergence from his self-imposed immaturity.
Immaturity is the inability to use one’s understanding without guidance
from another. This immaturity is self- imposed when its cause lies not
in lack of understanding, but in lack of resolve and courage to use it
without guidance from another. Sapere Aude! ‘Have courage to use your
own understand-ing!—that is the motto of enlightenment.<br>
<br>
--Immanuel Kant<br>
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