Devadatta Sangha II

Theravada principles describe a monk has to pursue oneself the perfection of three aims, Sila (morals), Samadhi (unwavering mind), and Prajna (wisdom). We commonly agree that these three aims are like the rungs in a ladder; without the basic rung of perfect morals one cannot attain the virtue of unwavering moral courage, again without the latter one cannot climb up further for achieving his insight for wisdom.

The objection arises. Why the purpose of fulfilling morals is only for attaining the unwavering mind and cannot be for any other else? Should its practical purpose be for serving the welfare of all Buddhists or perhaps all beings? Why should the perfection of morals not be for the purpose of completing one’s and perhaps all others’ ultimate happiness? In this article, I will dive into the realm of metaphysics to dissect why both those appealing practical purpose and the purpose for happiness are NOT the reasons for which morals are obliged to be fulfilled first and foremost as a Buddhist monk. I will assure you that the morals of a monk are exclusively for the purpose of the unwavering mind to achieve for eliminating all kinds of prejudices. As an introduction of prejudices, prejudices are driving forces of human motive to action. Prejudices are mainly of two kinds which are interconnected, congruent and concentric counterparts, inclination and fear. Their fundamental nature is admixed and one kind of prejudice such as inclination is always reflexive upon another kind, fear or vice versa.

Concerning the perspective of dissecting from metaphysics, the first critique of morals is to inquire what types of actions can be definitely determined as the moral worth. Human affairs are non-understandably complex. A poison for one can be a medicinal for another. Alcohol is inhibited in five Buddha’s percepts but it is a curative means to save the lives of persons who suffer from methanol poisoning. Killing is inhibited in Buddhism, however, when a patient who suffers from terminal illness strictly demands mercy killing, there is no better moral mean for her doctor except for doing a lethal injection out of his utmost sympathy.

Therefore, how can a Buddhist person claim himself be moral if actions alone cannot be said to be moral enough. Suppose an irreparable criminal is cut his tongue and imprisoned for twenty years. Can we say that he is perfect in five percepts for twenty years since he has not been doing any killing, stealing, abusing sex, telling lies or drinking? It is evident that actions which are alone are not moral actions. At the same time, nobody can claim his moral worth without a moral action really asserted. The latter principle is evident. A doctor cannot claim his moral honor until he practically treats a patient with the intention of alleviating a patient’s suffering. We become honest people by doing honest. We become kind people by doing kind. We become noble people by doing noble. Definitely, there is no other way else.

While actions are essential to morals, actions alone are not enough for meeting the perfect criteria. In fact, no action in this world can be said as moral unless a person has a good will to perform it. So far, I have argued for what Buddha has clarified, “Good or bad will is your Karma”. Nevertheless, at this point I seriously need to alert that unskillful interpretation of this message can lead to horrible errors to our humanity. Good will shall not be ineptly confused with the desire, wishful thinking or sluggishness. Good will certainly shall not be confused with hope. The most dangerous interpretation is ones’ becoming confusing good will with the end. The claim of socialists for ultimate golden paradise, the incurious nature of our Burmese, and the recurrent justification of raw Burmese military regime for protection of the union’s stability are all based on the confusion that they are doing things with their good will. Human greed, unrealistic hope and untouchable arrogance, all come in the common term of good will, which certainly is not these evils’ worth.

We simply can sense that we definitely need to know what exactly the good will is since infinite number of confused evils can easily plug in for it in human mind, which to be confessed honestly is most often unstable with the material attractions, prejudices for wants and fear resulting in imprecisions and unsoundness for our moral judgment. In explaining what definitely can be called as good will, I must argue for two basic points. The first point is good will is universal. The second point is good will is based on the merit of beings as rational.

Proposing these two basic points, I have to elaborate further to eliminate two major counter arguments. The first counterargument is good will is not to be accepted to honor it as a universal consensus; perhaps it may not be even necessary to have a good will in this competitive age of struggles. Who knows what Heaven dislikes and why it dislikes? All different beings are fully entitled to liberty, life and happiness by their own different means. It is ridiculous to define a universal agreement for the universal necessity of good will because people have their own self-interest. This counter argument can also take the utilitarian’s stance, “as long as the total material gained by the whole society is a plus, various wills of different people for pursuing the materials in available means can sufficiently be said as moral”. I would term this first counter-argument as irrational moral relativism, in which morals need to vary with different empirical experiences, practically required action and the demands of most efficient means to accomplish or gain the enjoyable things.

The position of moral relativism, even though dangerously appealing to the popular opinion, can be easily be refuted simply because of the fact that its assumption is only at the superficial level of practical reason and not at the metaphysical level of pure reason. By gripping practical reasons, a moral relativist will say either good will is completely absurd for a practical reason or whatever will that produces target outputs can be defined as good will. We need to see that the point that an irrational moral liberalist is to say he is perfectly liberal with any kind of justification is the same point to state that no justification is necessary for any kind of practical reason, indispensably resulting in utter moral annihilation.

Since practical reasons of different beings are countlessly numerous, the moral relativist is cumbersome to prove every other of all practical reasons can justify many a good will in their own means or all every others don’t require justification of a good will. The only way he can prove these all means in his moral relativist framework is that everybody has a right to do his own business because anybody’s knowledge is too limited to act perfect. No supreme intelligent person has been born to this world to understand every others’ human problems. Therefore, people are fully entitled for taking liberty to do whatever they can do in whatever means they know in their limited available knowledge.

We must be careful about that all these supportive descriptions of the argument of the moral relativist are absolutely correct. Obviously, these are the existing human situations and human are fully entitled to wrestle with their human problems by their own affordable means and methods. I have no opportunity to find any fault in these arguments of the moral relativist. However, it is obvious that I can easily expose the moral relativist that he has no right to hold these true situations and universal rights to morally justify whatever he does. Pointing the practical problems and holding the cause of the practical reasons can by no means be enough for justifying any (other) arbitrary action as moral. I can repeat the only possible argument of the moral relativist as my counter-argument, “human beings are too limited in their knowledge. Therefore, human beings are too limited in knowing that his free action for achieving his target results merely can be justified as morally good no matter how much he thinks himself as a considerate person and well-versed learner”. Ironically, the only possible supporting argument of the moral relativist’s position is hunting back to kill its master. The moral relativist is trapped with his own poison. I should repeat to emphasize that all statements of the moral relativist are correct and acceptable. The only incorrectness is that he is exploiting these correct situations (human problems) and correct propositions (entitlement for freedom) to his irrationality which is completely unacceptable to rational beings who will certainly demand a rational consensus for all kinds of actions are human are to act for self-interest or some results. We should also aware that as rational beings as ourselves, we don’t demand at all that a person should not have a choice of his own because of universally binding moral constraints; instead we merely advise him that we all together should look for what pure reason is required for whatever he likes to choose to do as moral.

The second major counterargument I must eliminate is moral egocentrism. In contrast to irrational moral relativism, the requirement of good will in doing an action is fully accepted in this stance, however, it assumes that good will is the moral worth of the well-learned, worthy people who knows superior Dharma, and who are more skillful in developing the good will. Simply, moral ego-centrists observe that good will varies with skills, talent and learning. While moral relativism is conceptually based on unpredictable randomness of the universe, the stance of moral ego-centrism is deterministic assuming that y always definitely varies with a certain magnitude of x. This stance is much more difficult to be refuted than moral relativism because it is directly related with the essentialism of self. The essentialism of self, as a common notion of people, always supposes there are descriptively superior selves against inferior selves. Our olfactory nerves can now come to sniff that the assumption that only certain people are certain for good will is actually nothing but based on the essence of the self, all Buddhas have arisen to challenge it thoroughly.

At that point, we can also sense our inescapability of one self even if one is so much speaking of mere interdependent origination and self-less-ness. So long as one is still seeing y varies with multiple regressions of x, aggrandizement can never be stopped and one will be continually trapped with infinite regression. Dharma is noble and honest but man is deceitful and credulous oneself. What Buddha urged us is to see the absence of y while even the wisest ones are misled to think about y regressed on x even when they come to know from Dharmas, y is not the xs. This is a common Mahayanist still misled problem in their emphasis on dependent origination from co-arising. XIV Dalai Lama defended that Buddhism should not be regarded by people as reductionistic but viewing the emptiness as the interconnected whole can still be easily entrapped in moral egocentrism. A Theravada misperception is more ironic because by gripping the cause and effect, they feel true about the continuum of x and y and finally assume that y is simply the equivalent of the aggregates of xs. Ego thus is miserably never extinguished because they think all xs as essences to synergize to form the grand essence of y. Therefore, both prevailing philosophies of Mahayana and Theravada are still in the dirty mud of moral ego-centrism. Without a deeper analysis to our psychological strata of mind, one cannot easily aware that grand, grander, grandest we are entrapped again and again in the net of finesse of moral ego-centrism. This second case is obviously much more subtle than bluntly rude irrational moral relativism and much more difficult to be exposed.

While blunt irrational moral relativism certainly result in explosion of societies and anarchy, subtle moral ego-centrism is what long-lived with human history resulting in different means of oppression, dictatorship and totalitarianism or perhaps even pretend as civilization, culture and norms of polite people. Nevertheless, as irrational moral relativism, moral egocentrism, which even though is not based on the practical reason, is mightily rooted in empirical evidence and its position can also be refuted by elaboration in metaphysical depth. Certainly, moral egocentrism is what makes up Devadatta Sangha. To mathematically simplify, all kinds of human problems arise simply from the basic assumption that y varies with x. Man who is always thirsty for certainty in his life amply accept this connection (Mahayanists think this connection as reality while Theravadists think all x, y and the connection between regressors and the regressee as reality and one aggregate) as the basis of rationality, whose merit in in-depth analysis of metaphysics cannot be admitted to qualify as rational.

(To be updated)

Devadatta Sangha I

I got a very interesting forwarded letter written by an interesting person called U Bandhu whom I don't know personally. I just polished some crude sentences and corrected a few misspelled Pali-names of his letter. Please do read the web link provided to understand the background contexts of the arguments lined out by the original writer.

I also intend to write my own critical analysis on the topic of separation of church and state as well as the absolute need of separation of any opportunist and state at a later time. The opportunistic person will claim he is honestly fighting for opportunityless Burmese people and democracy; for this reason, he badly needs to collaborate with this bad government for getting some opportunity.

To me, the logical contradiction of underscored words is enough to recognize that this kind of claim is not by any means psychologically honest. In psychological analysis perspective, this kind of position that "I am forced to associate with the bad people" is always associated with masochism and sadism which are both human (animal) instincts of ego. In Dhamma terms, Buddha collectively called these instincts of ours as dosa (fear and anger). A person with dosa is never morally honest, that Buddha explained to us as dosa-gatti (corruption from fear).

As for empirical evidence, bad association of opportunistic ethnic arm groups and this evil Burmese military government has already proved well enough in inflicting our society with many problems and agony at current time. I strongly feel that we should have some erudite tome of verification to stop this kind of opportunism and moral relativism which will certainly and easily misguide our people and our young generation into spoilt attitude of absolute moral debridement and shameless resignation just for filling one's belly with a piece of bread or cake in a completely wrong direction of bad company.

Let us keep reminding ourselves: before claiming the big term social justice, one should always check whether his act is moral enough himself to avoid degradation of the legitimate right of a single innocent person or whether he is still too much ignorant and illusory to know what makes justice and what makes not. There is always injustice even when one just stands in line with the bad and powerful people because this standing essentially means you are certainly selfish too much to stand in line equally with the suffering powerless for equal struggle and hardship alike. Mechanically, you are also poised ready to use any scrap of power abuse of the powerful ill people upon any member of the powerless.

Some may probably be curious whether power asymmetry can be lessened by releasing some lay people into the military-dominated parliament. If we correctly understand the psychological basis of the civilian parliament men, we can rightly conclude that there will be more bouts of sadism evolving one way or another rather than slackening of the totalitarian authority. This can also be called decentralization of tyranny from a few detached power scraps abused by these masochists and sadists who delusively think themselves as fighters for democracy and social justice. The biggest problem of we ignorant human is that one doesn't realize oneself but still thinks he knows or can know all others. A sad truth of Burmese democracy opera!

Thank you, Ko De Wall. I am glad that you were kindly aware of my usage of Buddhism (a trend) as a gender protagonist rather than Buddha (a person). Here is the sad story of Saccavadi abused terribly by her own country's monks in a so-called religious society.

http://sujato.wordpress.com/2010/02/16/saccavadis-story/

Well, before arguing this abuse was legitimate in its institutional authority sense, let me give a very clear example in functional sense at Buddha's time. One Bhikkhuni was banished from Devadatta's Sangha society because she was found pregnant. Buddha formed a committee led by Migara's mother (Visakha) to investigate whether her pregnancy was committed by a post-ordination intercourse. The Bhikkhuni was affirmed of her purity of Sila and accepted in Gautama's Sangha society to retain her status as a venerable Sangha. Even with the undeniable sight of a big belly observed in a woman, Buddha's Sangha society was simply (and functionally) objecting that Devadatta's Sangha society had no such blatant right to blame a religious woman as guilty and stupid.

What kind of evidence Burmese Sangha-Nayaka could have to say this Bhikkhuni was guilty and stupid? We can simply observe even in the functional procedure (which might be the easiest to be followed rather than abstract conceptual levels of Buddha's thought), Burmese Sangha-Nayaka was/is far away from what Buddha had really wanted their Sangha to behave.

Let us see the conceptual level at this moment. If Bhikkhuni ordination is to be denied by "All-Equal" at conceptual and spiritual level knowledge of Buddhist society, there can be only one excuse remaining that it is for the benefits in practical matters lest some harm will rise by quoting what Buddha had said (at least in Tripitaka) that the Sarsana will be shortened to 500 years if the allowance for ordination of Bhikkhunis were continued. Sarsana has been now more than 2,500 years and what is the reason for holding this so called Buddha's prophecy of Tripitiaka as valid?

In my view, many futuristic projections described in Tripitaka should be examined carefully because Buddha was very clear in rejecting futurism and had a very big inclination to minimize any talk about the future. In fact, that rejection of futurism was the most distinct character of Buddhism from any kind of religion and even any kind of worship, can you agree? Buddha clearly described how malicious is futurism to any individual; as I argued previously, "let stop and see here, don't think there is or there is not".

Concerning the institutional level authority, "any Sangha Raja or Sangha Nayaka" 's authority is illegitimate in the final words of Buddha from Maha-parinibbana Sutra, " (1)monks must respect each other according to seniority of monkhood (2) Dhamma is your only
teacher (3) be a lamp onto yourself . Therefore, almost all the governmental Sangha institutions or their authority in Thailand or Burma (I don't know much about Sri Lanka, but perhaps similar) are invalid in the real Theravada Buddhist tradition. A paradox indeed but an inconvenient truth to us.

The so-called Theravada will probably argue there was an official record that Buddha handed Sarsana to Ven. Maha Kassapa. I will simply argue Buddha, as a Buddha, never said such inconsistent words. If the three sayings were legitimate, then this claim of delegation had never ever been said by Buddha. Anybody can simply sense which words make sense as real Buddhism and real Buddhist practice. Even in canonical doctrines, there was not any significant contribution from Ven. Maha Kassapa except that he was acting as "the King of Sanghas" in the first Buddhist Council. I am not sure whether an Arhat (Saint) like Ven. Maha Kussapa would accept that "Raja of Sanghas " entitlement to him. All Buddhist Arhats should be not less than Jefferson who was annoyed at some guest calling him "Mr". Jefferson. It will be as foolish enough to be called "Royal Nation's Big Tamata U Thein Sein":-).

This essentially means at the real original Buddha's founding of Sangha, any separation from "Great Primary Sangha" is invalid and could be sued as Devadatta's crime of division of Sangha (Sangha-beda Karma) ; even philosophically-separated Burmese Shwe Gyin or Su-Dhamma or Sri Lanka's Abhayagiri Vihāra monastic societies should revise whether their institutions were committing Devadatta's acts by holding their separate identities; obviously founding State Sangha-Nayaka society, which was an economically separate association from Great Sangha, was surely red-handed committing that Devadatta's crime in association with Ajatasattu's gang Burmese government. "Bad association" was that very stupid behavior that Buddha took on seriously ( No.1 stanza in Mingala Sutra, see how important it is to our country, see how opportunists, cronies and this gang government are associating to crush Aung San Su Kyi and the old men).

Let me continue to say my comment on eight Garudhammas. I think it might be true that Buddha imposed these eight heavy rules on women for ordination. However, let us take a note that he never had said that women were inferior to men nor men were superior to women. The "Sangha" status after ordination was equal except that the Bhikkhunis should not blame male monks. Just for inhibiting very, very few actions, we can't say that Buddha is a sexist as most people will be inclined think so immediately. Here, we can safely say the prohibitions very very few even if their intensity was very strict. Buddha only said, "don't blame" but he didn't say "don't describe","don't defend ", "don't discuss" and "don't argue" .

As we know, "blame" is always a judgment even the male monks shall even not do on each other. The matter might be that Pajapati Gotami as a Queen and her 500 followers who were the princesses, as the royal aristocrats, could probably be very judgmental in their mundane attitudes. Buddha's Sangha men at that time could be full of the poor, the servants, the beggars, the criminals and many chaotic people from the low strata from society. So he just wanted to remove the royal glasses of the princesses by bureaucratic mechanism at a single shot, which might also encourage critical thinking of the Bhikkhunis.

Perhaps, Buddha might think women are more judgmental than men, I wish there is a research on this matter to prove it as true: -). Well at least in my observations, as you know in Burma, there are very few men to attend a handsome monk's preaching and such preaching place was always brimming with women audience. It seemed to me that at least they have more positive judgment on the handsome male monks than we guys, aha!

Regards,

U Bandhu

The apology of Burmakin VIII

Burmakin: Your majesty, you may be a poisonous communist rather than a King Buddhist! Who knows what Heaven dislikes and what it likes? I have felt ashamed that these elite Mahayanists, influenced by Western education or biased towards the support of the West, are liberalizing Buddhism. I now feel that their liberalizing Buddhism is not that worse than what you are propagandizing – communizing Buddhism. No, people are not equal and can never be equal. I am sure about that. Exactly, this is the illusion of communists!

King of Angels: Well, my son.
Who knows what Heaven dislikes and what it likes? Even I, the King and the Great Representative of Heaven, found it a very difficult question. Discover this blame of yours yourself, my son. You can uncover the truth. This is the revelation of Buddha and Heaven!

Burmakin:
I see, your majesty. We all are so equal in that any one of us can't establish the truth. We all are so equal in that every one of us must respect this universal truth that we can't establish the truth. I see, your majesty. Have we deviated so much from Buddha's Middle Way by establishing us on the middle way(s)?

King of Angels: Well, my son. Of course, I appreciate you Burmese for your love of Heaven. You, Burmese race, are perhaps the last men in Asia to maintain this great traditional love of Heaven of mankind. The love of Heaven can make one heavenly. But the same love can make one helly if one is tempting to establish Heaven on Earth.

Burmakin: OK, I see we have two big problems in our Burmese Buddhists' understanding. The first is the fallacy of the middle ground. We simply believe the middle ground between two extremes is always or usually correct. The second is the same problem with communists' intellectual arrogance. We haughtily believe our current position is the true middle and is the only solution to all kinds of human problems. In that way, all Burmese have the same spoiled attitude with communists. We believe we are intelligent; our intuition is very strong; we know how to do; we can make moral prophecy for setting everything right, and we can powerfully establish those right things on earth.

King of Angels:
Well, my son. Let me repeat here. What Buddha teaches us eight right practices in the Middle way is to set yourself (NOT yourselves) right. You Burmese should be cautious to stop your singular self at this point, not to root and distribute yourselves as true.

For me, there is only one problem to you mankind, that some men believe they are more equal than others.

Burmakin: Isn't it true? I am a medical doctor. I am highly educated. Few people in this world can go to classified universities and learn the best education. Shouldn't I or a Harvard, Brown University graduate or a PhD doctor believe we are more equal than others? How can such belief make the only problem to mankind?

King of Angels: Is that so? My son, I then need to drive you into a disillusioning method, famously known to the West as the Socratic Method.

Burmakin: I don't think Socrates was the only person to use that method. Our Teacher, Buddha, applied this questioning method to encourage critical thinking in many of his debates that our nominal Burmese Buddhist culture was absolutely lacking. I will prefer to call Buddha's method that Socrates might have copied. You know both great sages were born around the same time. Anyway, I will welcome your set of questions.

King of Angels: OK, my son. Why do you believe a Harvard PhD graduate or a highly educated person is more equal than the rest of the mankind?

Burmakin: I think these few elite people who earned very high degrees from prestigious universities can perform better human relationship than the lowly educated which are the majority that Plato once thought as the ignorant who would dominate democracy into the tyranny of the majority. Until today's modern Democratic age, we need the platonian philosopher kings for establishing better and perhaps perfect human relationships, your majesty. You can't deny that.

King of Angels: Hey, my son. Did Buddha ever teach us that performing human relationship should be based on the medical degree, Harvard graduation or PhD fellowship or something coming out from Brown?

Burmakin: No. But your majesty, perhaps, at that time, there was no Brown or Harvard University in the time of His holy enlightenment.

King of Angels: Did Buddha ever teach us something definite for performing human relationship?

Burmakin: Of course, why not? Buddha taught us very definite that performing human relationship should be based on metta (non- anger), karuna (compassion, putting yourself in the shoes of others), mudita (non-jealousy), and upekkhā (non-bias to one's own feeling).

King of Angels: Do you think a Harvard PhD graduate do have less anger than a Roman Catholic Nun?

Burmakin: No.

King of Angels: Do you think a Harvard PhD graduate can have less anger than a Buddhist monk?

Burmakin: No. Why should we compare that crazy graduate with our venerable Buddhist monks?

King of Angels: How about a beggar? Can this elite educated person have less anger than a faceless lowly educated nothing-venerable beggar? As a matter of fact, let us remember that faceless beggarhood is the generic choice of my Supreme Teacher Buddha in founding his Sanga society.

Burmakin: Yes, beggarhood is the generic choice of our Supreme Teacher as the noblest livelihood in this world.
No, your majesty, I can't say a Harvard PhD graduate can have less anger than a holy beggar. But at that point, I am not sure pennilessness and educationlessness is certainly related.

King of Angels: OK, how about just a seven year old child, my son? That great elite PhD person can have less anger than a child?

Burmakin: No. But a seven year old child can also be irritable.

King of Angels: Ok, which irritability is harmful? The irritability of a seven year old child or arrogance and anger of an Ivory League person?

Burmakin: Of course, arrogance and anger of an Ivory League person is more harmful. Robert McNamara, who wrongly justified the Vietnam War that killed millions of the Vietnam people, was a Harvard Business School graduate. I heard that he scored the undefeatable highest grades in all kinds of examinations in his education life.

King of Angels: So, do you still think an Ivory League highly educated person performs better human relationship than a seven year old child? You are now speaking that he is not even better than a nun, a Buddhist monk, a faceless beggar or even a seven year old child.

Burmakin: Yes. How bad had been I to hold this kind of intoxicated mistake for such a long time of my old and even nearly extinguishing time of life! What is the problem with that? It is obvious that the graduate degrees or education scores have nothing to do with performing better human relationship. What really matters in human relationship?

King of Angels: It is called moral intelligence. Buddha and I beautified it as Four Great Dharmas of Brahma. You know they are metta, karuna, muditha and upekkhā. The fourth Dharma, upekkhā, "let it be", non-action that is Wu-wei, in Chinese Taoism, is the most important of all. The problem of McNamara, American Southerners during the civil war and your whole lot of Burmese at present was this ignorance about the let-it-be Brahma Dharma of Teacher Buddha and Lao-Tzu.

Burmakin: Let me ask you later for illustrating why this fourth Dharma of Brahma is the most important for human relationship. For the moment, I still think a highly educated person is still much more useful. Perhaps, they can't perform better human relationship but they can perform better for providing a lot of beneficial human services. Since they are better educated, they can provide better services. It does make sense, your majesty?

King of Angels: Let me ask you, my son. Aung San Su Kyi was an Oxford graduate. When her son Alexander was seven years old, what kind of services to this seven year old child from his mother was important? The services of an Oxford graduate or the services of a mother?

Burmakin: What a non-sense! What has to be done with the Oxford degree to a seven year old child? The services of the mother are the most important to any child.

King of Angels: Which one is nobler? Motherhood or Oxford graduatehood?

Burmakin: Stupid. Motherhood is the noblest of everything. Even Buddha had to venerate it.

King of Angels: Then you are now acknowledging that a mother who provides good mother services to her child is better and nobler than any kind of high, high prestigious degree person.

Burmakin: OK, I understand you will again say being a good son (daughter), being a good brother (sister), and being a good friend, and being a good citizen and being a good man (woman), offers better services to any of us than Oxford or Harvard graduates can offer their services to mankind. Perhaps, this good-looking word "mankind" even is a big problem of our illusion in not understanding the fundamentals.

But, I am not losing to you yet. How about a medical doctor who can alleviate the suffering of his patients? A mother doesn't know what to do when her child becomes ill but the pediatrician does. There is usefulness in those highly educated degrees. Such higher education gets you skills to provide better human services.

King of Angels: Ok, my son. Let me ask you. Your eldest brother and many of your friends are very high-earning physicians in America and Singapore. Their income is in the 95^th percentile in those countries. Do you respect them or think them as noble persons?

Burmakin: No.

King of Angels: Why you can't respect them? They have such high medical skills from higher education to earn such enormous income that do commensurate with their beneficial services to society.

Burmakin: No. I can't respect them for their higher education, skills and wealth. All these things, when a person, even with a normal average IQ, works hard and his family support is good enough, he can achieve such a status. That is not a surprise.

King of Angels: Of course, my Teacher Buddha once criticized about stunning ascetic practices, "What has to be done with those incredible practices. Even a slave girl can practice such and such". So when will you respect your brother and your colleagues?

Burmakin: Yes, I will respect them if they are good persons. If they have minimal greed, minimal anger and minimal ignorance and bear their genuine sincerity towards others. I can't respect them for their skills and income but I will respect them if their mind is good.

King of Angels: Well, my son. Even if you don't respect them for their skills, I will respect them because their medical knowledge and skills are dealing directly with your worst human problems of suffering, disease, death and aging. Skills are the essentials of the morals. Without accumulating the skills, a person cannot be moral enough, no matter his mind is purely good.

For me as a third person impartial spectator, I must bow to a person who has the skills. But be aware that even though we, Savakas, admire the skills as important, my noblest Teacher, Buddha, would not call the skilled people as holy people (See The apology of Burmakin VII). For you as a first person, a free human being, you are free to not respect any skilled person if you like because you do have your own role of your skill and any of you human can achieve any kind of skill if everything else is Ceteris paribus.

(Note: The government as a third person also is needed to respect
the skills and roles of all citizens)

Burmakin: So what is your point?

King of Angels: Obvious enough, my son. Degrees and education are nothing to do with goodness of a person. Only the person who applies the skills consciously and morally is a good person, that Buddha and we Savakas will appreciate.

Burmakin: And that good person who applies skills consciously and morally will never be arrogant to think and act that he is more equal than all others.

King of Angels: Of course, that is the
worst problem of failing Burmese society, my son. There are two gravely wrong assumptions in your enclosed society. The first one is many come to think they are the philosopher kings. The second one is many think a society ruled by philosopher kings will develop wish-everything-you-get-tree from the ground.

Burmakin: What is that fault in a person thinking to raise himself as the philosopher king? If somebody tries the hardest and incredible, he can even be a Buddha. What is wrong with that?

King of Angels: If I repeat my set of questions, will you still think that a philosopher king is more important than a mother, a son or a friend or a physician or a good person?

Burmakin: I see. Even with due respect, you can even replace Buddha in the place of the philosopher king. That is why; Buddha didn't bother to live more than eighty years. Both in principle and practice, his presence was not important to us and human affairs. The only importance is we should try ourselves to be good men. "Be a lamp onto yourselves", that is the core Buddha's teaching for individualism of Buddhist philosophy.

King of Angels:
Well, my son. Don't find a brilliant father and but let yourself be a good son to your own parents. Don't find to be a father to many, but be a modest father to your own children. The desideratum of mankind is that don't fool yourself to be a holy person to many but just be a good person to yourself and your environment.

That " just " I stressed out presents the understanding to all four Noble truths, Dukkha Truth (limitation of your human being), Samudaya Truth (Limitlessness of exaggeration), Magga Truth ( Understanding of your limitation and behave modestly according to this understanding), and Nirodha Truth (Realization of a state).

Burmakin: Looking like this "just" is very important. Is this called Wu-wei, non action in Tao?

King of Angels: Of course, this is the way of Tao. If all of you know how important is "just", your mankind will be on the just way and you all can adjust to situations correctly to be living good together. Buddha also expressed four components of Wu-wei in Mingala Suttra: to respect, to be humble to yourself, to be modest, to know gratefulness. Those are great blessing to human society, my son.

The apology of Burmakin Va- part II

A Buddhist philosophy from Renaissance:

Neither heavenly nor earthly, neither mortal nor immortal have we created thee, so that thou mightiest be free according to thy own will and honor, to be thy own creator and builder. To thee alone we gave growth and development depending on thy own free will. Thou bearest in thee the germs of a universal life. (Pico della Mirandola)

Burmakin: Your majesty, every Buddhist in this world understands that a Buddhist is always self-sufficient. Thus what I never have heard from a lip of any authorized person of Buddhism like you are currently saying.

Buddhism is for encouraging an individual’s efforts for her ultimatum of mutually exclusive dwelling in Nirvana, the Supremeness, NOT for formulating social design or social policy. How come your majesty comes with such a self-opposing remark that Buddhist philosophy is founded on social relationship as well as self-liberation?

The consensus of all Buddhists is working for cutting off all bondages, those social ties which are evils against one’s own liberation. What we all Buddhists adore is the bliss of renunciation. Such a giant Buddhist like you is, but contradicting yourself!

King of Angels: My son, you are right in saying that Buddhism is not for formulating social design but you are absolutely wrong in claiming that Buddhism is not concerned with any social policy, which in fact was the primordial aim of our Teacher in his inquest for human freedom! Buddhism is wholly founded on his holiness’ critical investigation on social policy and is a sort of giant socialism.

However, this genuine socialism must not be confused with deceitful socialism which cheats people by idealizing the uncontrollable impulses of human wants and expressing irrational leniency over the powerless for sake of tactical expediency of those cheater socialists who manipulates the vast mass of population into dehumanization by their irrational cheap rationalization of justice, fairness and equality.

You can learn an equal instance of what I am trying to explain by observing Edmund Burke’s completely different opinions on American Revolution and French Revolution. Do you get any insight?

Burmakin: Yes, your majesty. It is very interesting. Why that kind of contradiction happened: Burke had admired American Revolution so much but why he seriously condemned the one made by the Frenchmen?

Had not both revolutions tried to uproot the dogmatic antique traditional systems? Had he been consistent to be emphatic with revolutionaries of different nations for fighting against those bad dictators and those bad traditions, this great statesman should have been more respectable.

King of Angels: My son, it is because “Revolution” of Americans was heard in the ears of Burke as true revolution which came from the deep realization and respect for the universal principle of freedom and equality of all human beings. However, “ Revolution “ of Frenchmen was heard in the ears of Burke as a hoax of expediency which emerged from human psychological insufficiency of lust for power of the powerless who once were miserably oppressed and treated as low as animals.

It is to be cautious that people who want to dominate, want to be violent, want to earn better opportunity also always name themselves as revolutionists. In the same way, people who don’t pay respect to the laws of nature that forever imposes the serious limitation, weakness and vulnerability on you humans, think themselves they are able to control nature completely, and are confusing Liberty with dangerous futurism from their psychological insecurity, also call themselves as socialists. It is not on equal terms with the authentic socialists of we Buddha’s Sarvakas who have deep admiration on selfless but very individualistic,brilliant social work of our Socialist Teacher.

My suckling son, your human language is full of farces such that a snake’s head is swallowing its own tail. In this light of this irreparable weakness of you humans, language as the only medium of communication for your understanding of knowledge, to be a wise man is to know what is genuine and what is artificial, not to become a contender on these ambivalent terms of the language.

My dear son, don’t argue the definition of Democracy with your mischievous military government and those endless chain rings of opportunists for power. The difference between a fool and a wise man is that a wise man knows what is the universally authentic reason behind a word whereas a fool never considers it. The maturity of a Buddhist depends on his capability to discriminate whether “diamond” of a voice is indicating a real diamond or an imitate one.

My son, fight for justice only for realization of what justice is, both for your love for wisdom and the enlightenment of your enemies, not on contending with the ignorant on those farces of the linguistic terms, absolutely not by pointing out what the justice is since you are as ignorant as all others in terms of positive justice.

Notwithstanding, never undermine yourself. Do appreciate yourself in your love for fighting against the gross injustices emerging from ignorance.

Be heroic but fight vigorously against heroism.

Be prudent but eliminate passiveness and impotency which will pretend as prudence.

Be duly non-biased but seriously subdue irrational moral relativism of the rational fools.

Respect the value of reason but don’t worship rationality.

Be as much rational as possible but never rationalize.

Be rigorously self-critical and bear humility but don’t fall into the trap of exorbitant humbleness and defend affirmatively on what you believe as true after you have wisely re-examined it.

Listen to others with understanding and empathy, respect the diversity and critical discussions with fellow human beings but dogmatically argue in defense of truth and liberty as if you have the divine power.

Be sure on that Heaven has no discount AT ALL for universal values of liberty, equality and humanity.

Burmakin: Thanks for you kind instructions, your majesty. I can also agree to your point in fray of our human language. The authority of any government in this world solely relies on the opinion of the people. Of course, it is such illegitimate Burmese government’s quack authority which actually rests on the opinion of our Burmese. It is our fragile and malleable language through only which we could develop our opinion.

We Burmese have tons of misdirected opinions on our understanding of the words. You know, one obvious example is that whatever stupid every dictatorial ruler of this world, what he is so clever in doing is “channeling” the rhetoric. Those villain regimes manipulate their people by either restricting and distorting the information so that they are able to rule people’s opinion on which their power ultimately rests.

People in free societies do understand that we human have serious limitations in understanding of the language. We in the closed society are tweaked, cheated, indoctrinated, and deprived of our own self by those social ills emerged from the rulers’ power madness. The ironic is the more we are tweaked and cheated, the more we come to think we know all and everything. It is such an irreparable illusion of a Burmese rational fool to think himself he knows this and that and the meaning of the words are lucidly this and that for sure.

We have never been smart because we have never really understood what smartness is. I see. It actually is the start of all dangers once somebody thinks himself that he is very smart or at least smarter than others.

King of Angels: Well, my son. When the Nazis gained the power in Germany, Hitler claimed that Nazis were the supreme noble fighters for the whole world’s peace. The only authority he confessed to rule above the Nazis was the Nature.

When the lower middle class opportunists would finally blow out your military government and get their power in the future, they are sure to claim in the same way. They will be only afraid of the nature but they strongly believe they are the fittest among all in the nature so they survive. They will justify any rule favorable for survival of the fittest. The unfit will be thrown away as the rabble in your future society of ultimate Darwinianism .

In that society, there will no longer be a place for the survival of the righteous. Opportunism, communitarianism, relativism will be the dominant thoughts of this society of rationalism fundamentalists. The words such as “universal”, “absolute “, and “ nirvana”, "truth" and all other related words will be eliminated from your Burmese language.

You will no longer find Burmese people speak about faith, but they will speak only about the reason as they understand it. They will not discuss about ethics but they will only consider what are the efficient means.

By uprooting the despair and dogmatism of your present Burmese military government’s society, your future shaped by so-called revolutionists’ society will be grasping another irrational extreme of relativists.

Burmese will lose the identity of “Burmese Buddhist” by this time. You will replace your identity as Burmese relativists as your national social character.

Burmakin: I can’t agree with you in this respect, your majesty. Everybody in this world knows Theravada Buddhists, who believe in the diversity of Karma and Dharmas, are inclined to be more pluralistic and relativistic than Christians or all other Abrahamic the devout who trust in the Absolute God and the Immortality. You know Christianity principally has an authentic order to generalize the universal nature of the Human.

Are you aware that masses of young generation Buddhists of Burma have now been rapidly converting to peaceful Christianity in their despair over relativism and restlessness of their parental Buddhism. How can people who have been stormed and shattered by relativistic attitudes should be in love with relativism again? How can Burmese young people who are offered with warmness and shelter of universal values and Humanness of Christianity could come to live with such antique disarrayed attitudes of violence which they come to see as false values of Buddhists’ relativistic rationalization.

King of Angels: Well, my son. The answer is the same instance with how Burke recognized the word, “ Revolution” in his ears. You need to examine the genuine reason behind this hugely growing conversion rather than terming Christianity as peaceful and Buddhism as violent as you understand it.

Burmakin: Aren’t the reasons I suppose not genuine enough? Buddhists are always more or less violent. The whole South East Asia History is full of blood battles and coups committed by people of Buddhist Kingdoms in this region since the long, long ancient times.

Every legal scholar in this world knows universal human rights are based on values of Christianity. Burmese have the inalienable right to embrace peace of the Father in such despair over and oppression from Buddhist tyrants.

Buddha has already passed away so he would not come back to punish those devils. However, the Jesus assured us that He would come back once again to the world for the equality and justice of all human beings!!

What kind of assurance you could give us as a broker released by Buddha? Perhaps, you are just frustrated at your Buddhist market failure. You are smart only in your war tricks with Asuras but not as a businessman for retaining customers for Buddhism. A pity!

King of Angels: Well, my son. You are still misunderstanding what the word “Buddhist” is real about. You are understanding Buddhism and Christianity as this and that and get into the trap of becoming a rational fool that you yourself have just claimed as the most dangerous falsehood of humanity.

Hey my son, Buddha means the awakened one. Everybody who has wakened up from violent relativist dispositions are to be respected by we Heavenly beings as Buddhists. I never think Buddhists and Muslims as this and that. What I regard is who have Buddhist virtue and who have not.

I see many Buddhists around this world as mere pluralists, materialists, futurists, empiricists, nirvanists, reductionists and not as the waken up ones from dual consciousness. I can see many Muslims and Christians as affirmative or potential Buddhists who think the equality of all the Human in their balance of faith and reason.

Only the universal principles can discriminate who are entitled to be called Buddhists and who are not eligible, my son. Not the other way round.

Burmakin: I see, your majesty. In terms of the Buddhist value as virtue and respect for humanity, your Buddhist market is actually a boom and is not on the track of regression as I thought.

King of Angels: Well, my son. You are correct in saying that young Burmese have despair over Buddhism so that they become the convert. But this despair is not because their traditional Buddhism itself is dogmatic and violent. Some may justify their conversion by pointing out these pitfalls; some may also really think Buddhism is dogmatic and violent. However, these justifications are not the genuine reasons for their conversion.

Burmakin: Then what really happened to them? Perhaps, you will go down to psychological roots as I know your mastery of Sakka Suttra is all about human psychology.

King of Angels: The reason is my son. Those young people lose their individuality by living in Buddhism. They become feeling so powerless, insecure and especially couldn’t find the values in themselves for their continuance with Buddhism.

Burmakin: Lord Buddha, how come this happens! What a paradox of the world. How can a person in the most individualistic world religion come to lose her individuality and not be able to find the values in herself.

King of Angels: Well, my son. The succinct explanation of this thesis needs heavy volumes of writings. Briefly, remember what I said before. There is a sort of adhesive love towards someone, who lives within your human flesh, splits you human into duality and drives your characters into dehumanization.

In layman terms, this guy is called the lust for power; In technical term it is called sadomasochism. This was the same guy who drove Martin Luther and Calvin into developing new concepts of Christianity of reformed faith, which had had titanic clashes against human civilizations. Just remember that my prophecy of your future Burma driving into irrational Darwinism is based on careful observation of such social human behavior of civilization. I will turn back to this topic later.

At this moment, let me continue to elaborate why Buddhism is a gigantic social policy. This topic, I regard as imminently important for protecting your Buddhist society into the savageness of Darwinism and Nazism completely dominated by rational fools.

Burmakin: Your divine prophecy is extremely interesting but also an utter frustration. OK, let drop off this complex topic for a moment. Here I will ask where is the empirical evidence to show that Buddha was not on the principle of self-sufficiency and conceded to the principle of social animal in his inquest for freedom?

Should individual instincts be sufficient enough for his motivation for his voluntary struggling and noble sacrifices for the whole universal welfare? I don’t think Buddhism has any particular focus on developing better social relationships. All it is speaking is the universal welfare or individual freedom; it is what it is, that is Buddhism as it is.

Most Buddhists clearly believe social relationships as harassing unworthy bondages. Didn’t you ever hear that Buddha is a mother killer? He killed Maya (tricks and ropes of Loka (society)) that is the name of his natural mother! It is absurd to think that a person who killed his mother for his benefit had a serious concern about his mother which is a bondage against his liberation. You have to cut the umbilical cord of the newly born infant from mother otherwise the newborn cannot be his own.

King of Angels: Well, you are speaking in this way because you wrongly assume that you are born out of society. We heavenly divine well understand that it is not society where you are born, but it is from you individuals society was born.

Bodhisattvas and we all Buddha Savakas are naturally individualistic because individuality is the primordial form and society is the derivative. At this point, you can be cautious of this huge problem in your human understanding of the self. This me-self as later found out by Mead, is also the same Sakkaya ditthi that our Teacher Buddha warned against us as the most cumbersome obstacle in realizing our I-self. We, Buddha’s savakas, are just cutting off this bondage of me-self. Renunciation is a surgical procedure for denuleating Sakkaya ditthi, which in fact is our own faulty reflections on life within ourselves. Contrary to what you currently understand, we don’t kill our mother because there is no your mother since the beginning. There is only one woman in the wold,my son. She belongs to every one. But you realize that she has never been with you when you ultimately come to find your I-self.

We just denucleate this trivial part of our own. Instead, after discovering our ultimate I-self , Savakas are fully in love with society, fully identical with humanity, and we realize that we ourselves are the Bhrama of this universe. We are the Everything.

Let me also know your human understanding. Where on earth you have some empirical evidence in saying that Buddhism is not founded on social relationship, but assurance of self-sufficiency?

Burmakin: Your majesty, when Bodhisattva Siddhartha was stopped by Satan, he was offered two choices: either he returned to his palace and emerged as the universal king for the welfare of all beings or a faceless ascetic to be aloof in those dangerous jungles on his own whose fate has full uncertainty about the final outcome of his recalcitrant pursuit for realization of enlightenment. He took the second choice that was the strong empirical evidence in his undermining of the role of social relationship.

Nevertheless, I like your explanation on Sakkaya ditthi. Societal images of one’s own identity, of course, are strongly related with those crude junks of Sakkaya ditthi, but perhaps for the ultra levels we may need to deal with meditation.

Let me be curious. Where on the Heaven your argument comes out that the primordial aim of our Teacher is his critical investigation on social policy if you acknowledge Buddha’s Savakas are so individualistic?

King of Angels: My son, the great Taoist, Lao Tsu, who was my another great Teacher, was just enjoying riding a buffalo’s back, wandering the forests in rural areas in his bliss of peace for freedom.

His thinking, originally was regarded as a shun away from a societal life. But, are you aware about how the contemporary liberal Chinese who are concerned about the clashes between their nations’s dominant authoritarianism and prevailing radical tendencies of revolt for changing their stagnant political system, think about his teaching?

Burmakin: Ah yes. I have had some interviews with a number of Chinese and Tibetan liberals on my visit to China. They have the consensus that the harmony, the core principle of Yin and Yang of their traditional Taoism, is very important in changing their society without violence and bloodshed.

They even view the US constitution as the same philosophy of harmony of Yin and Yang which manifests as checks and balances or Charles Montesquieu’s separation of powers. It was a surprise for me even democracy is finally found as being based on such an ancient principle from a Buddha’s contemporary sage.

I am confused but proud. The thinking for democratic principles is not started in the West but in the East. The world itself is full of paradox for naïve learners like me.

King of Angels: Well, Chinese medicine and martial arts were among the first to apply these democratic principles of checks and balances. As a medical doctor, did you find any proof of the correctness of my Great Teacher’s insight?

Burmakin: Ah, we have learned in physiology that there is an inherent principle of the function of all living cells which is called homeostasis. Homeostasis is the main mechanism to restore the integrity of the living cells’ environment. The secretion of hormones must be turned on and off as needed to maintain this principle of homeostasis which must be accomplished by neural or feedback mechanisms.

This is essentially the same principle with the importance of harmony of interdependent, contrary and polar forces in Yin and Yang! How could this Great Teacher envisage this essential mechanism of living things without an electron microscope?

King of Angels: Then what happens when this balance of homeostasis is disturbed in your living cells of mortality?

Burmakin: The disturbance of this balance results in over-expression of the genes for growth factors which are originally required for the proliferation of normal cells. Over-expression happens when inhibitory signals on controlling the expression those genes are distorted. This is the main mechanism of pathogenesis of tumor formation in higher animals. Checks and balance and harmony are not only important to the peaceful cohesion of society but also inherent in the integrity of a biological life.

It is so stunning to understand Teacher Lao’s teaching is widely applicable from a DNA helix of a microscopic biological life to those titanic clashes of human civilizations and social cohesion. But how is it when we want to apply Buddha’s principles for such wide applications? Your majesty still has not convinced me any parallel example from Buddhism.

King of Angels: When you are talking about the choice of Siddhartha in his ultimate life, let me talk about the choice of Bodhisattva Sumedha in the first and foremost life in our Teacher’s pursuit of Buddhahood. Which ambivalent choices our Holy Teacher Sumedha hermit faced in his meeting with Buddha Dipankara last four infinite periods and a thousand hundred eons ago?

Burmakin: He was also faced with two choices that time: either he will attain Nirvana for himself or he will bear the burden of a social life for his struggle for Buddha enlightenment for four infinite periods and a thousand hundred eons therein after.

I see. This critical ambivalent situation for choices is our current debate: whether Bodhisattva would choose to be self-sufficient or to be living as a social being. He chose to be living as a social animal. Then my recent argument, perhaps the general understanding of Buddhism by almost all, is to be seriously reexamined as this assumption now looks suspicious.

King of Angels: Don’t be merely suspicious. Actually, this authentic choice of Bodhisattva is a complete refutation. What do you think of it as the reason for Bodhisattva for his suffering as a social animal? Did he ever think about just trying to get an Arahat’s enlightenment which could easily obtained at hand? Did he imagine about stepping this Arahat’s enlightenment up into Buddhahood?

Burmakin: I see, this is a complete refutation against the divine power as well as objectivism. Buddhism assumes that a divine (an arahat) cannot be the Divine (Buddha) any more.

King of Angels: My son, Boddhisattva Sumedha in his abundant wisdom realizes that wisdom cannot come out of divinehood. Wisdom comes out from your stupidity, ignorance , struggle and learning. His abundant wisdom spontaneously assigned him to choose to be an ignorant being as you are. And the reason behind this choice lies only on fulfilling his ultimate purpose.

Burmakin: For his omniscient wisdom?

King of Angels: A sort of. But I may prefer to a modest and more sensible word which looks more authentic. My son, this sacrifice of Bodhisattva for just living as an ignorant being as many others for such horrible long eons in varieties of animal and human kingdoms has a single technical purpose, which is articulation!

Burmakin: I see, your majesty. How serious this problem of our human language limitation imposing restrictions on our rationality and enlightenment! How difficult is this process of articulation! Even the Bodhisattva’s primordial wisdom of abundance is far, far away from being able to articulate.

King of Angels: My son, there seems to be only one solution to your human problem. You, elite mankind, acquire a consciousness of limitation of the human mind, at once simple and profound enough, humble and sublime enough!

Burmakin: Most often you are saying paradoxes, your majesty. How can we be simple and profound enough at the same time, humble and sublime at the same moment?

King of Angels: Well, once you understand this application of the primordial abundant wisdom of Bodhisattva Sumedha on laying down the principles of ten imperfect practices for his march to Buddhahood, you come to comprehend what I am saying.

Burmakin: You majesty, you look to be in a haste. It should be ten perfect practices.

King of Angels: No, my son, I am saying what I am supposed to say. The practices to Buddhahood are called ten imperfect practices because each one is extremely imperfect and need a triangulated support of the others so that all ten together in their solidity can become perfect enough for working to be a Buddha.

Burmakin: A paradox again, but very sensible!

King of Angels: Well, I will continue to elaborate on them so that you can be finally convinced how all these imperfect practices reflect our gigantic socialist Teacher’s primordial thinking on Social Policy.

Burmakin: So and so. Then these imperfect practices are also our Teacher’s hypothesis of his Social Theory.

King of Angels: Of course, they do. But it is neither thesis-antithesis nor negation of negation as if some contemporary Buddhists have such new interpretations on Buddhism. The theory refutes but doesn’t dispel. Again it is because a Bodhisattva in his supreme self-hood at that moment have the abundant wisdom to defend his supreme individuality for his love for these principles of Humanity.