Recently someone asked how to stop the fighting in one of the world's many armed conflicts.
I answered as best as I could but, of course, people have been asking how to end violence for millennia - certainly for as long as we've been killing one another.
In last night's reading, I came across The Great Learning, a text written by Confucius over 2,500 years ago. In just a few lines, he crystallizes my rough answer to this serious question.
If only, over the last 2,500 years, more people had taken his teaching to heart.
In ancient times, wanting to illuminate luminous Integrity in all beneath heaven, they began composing their nation.
Wanting to compose their nation, they began putting their families in order.
Wanting to put their families in order, they began cultivating themselves.
Wanting to cultivate themselves, they began rectifying their minds.
Wanting to rectify their minds, they began trueing-up their thoughts.
Wanting to true-up their thoughts, they began siting their understanding.
And to site understanding is to see deep into things themselves.
Once things themselves are seen deeply, understanding is sited.
Once understanding is sited, thought is trued-up.
Once thought is trued-up, mind is rectified.
Once mind is rectified, self is cultivated.
Once self is cultivated, family is in order.
Once family is in order, the nation is composed.
And once the nation is composed, all beneath heaven is tranquil.
I hope you'll practice as if the world depends upon it. Because it does.
Self-portrait by Egon Schiele, Leopold Museum, Vienna
In one sentence ... we have met the enemy and he is us!
Posted by: Petah digby | July 12, 2014 at 07:04 AM
Yes! This is the passage I always think of when discussion turns to whether a particular problem is a personal failure or a systemic problem. The answer is yes!
In 2,500 years, Confucius' system has "not been tried and found wanting; it has been found difficult and not tried." (To appropriate Chesterton.)
Posted by: Ben Butina | July 13, 2014 at 06:23 AM