--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, "Irmeli Mattsson" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > When a politician tells lies and manages to foul up people's > judgment and gets elected as president, maybe nature wanted > him to do bad things to test you. You trusted this candidate, > because he had influential supporters, who affirmed you him > to be very trustworthy and basically faultless.You voted for > him, and now you are responsible for the consequences? > This is what I understand you to be explaining here.
Yes, that's one possible scenario, if a rather simplistic one. But that's the basic idea. The larger point is simply that it's impossible to know what nature "wants" and why. The consequences and the "reasons" may be impossibly complex, or might not even resemble any sort of reasoning humans can grasp, let alone fitting the human notion of "perfection." Another angle to it is that whatever actions you assume authorship of, you get to take (karmic) responsibility for. Michael Dean Goodman has pointed out that in the phrase "spontaneous right action," the emphasis is on "spontaneous," not "right." The premise about enlightenment is that the enlightened person always acts spontaneously according to the dictates of nature, without mistakenly assuming authorship of his/her actions. But this is experiential; the person who isn't enlightened can't "mood-make" that he or she is not the author of his/her actions. > --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, "authfriend" <jstein@> wrote: > > > > --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, TurquoiseB <no_reply@> wrote: > > <snip> > > > Who here still believes that enlightenment confers > > > perfection on the one who claims to have realized (or > > > who actually *has* realized) enlightenment? Who here > > > believes that the actions of the enlightened are *by > > > definition* "in accord with the laws of nature" and > > > thus are *always* "life supporting?" > > > > I don't rule it out. > > > > BUT: > > > > As I understand the premise (and have argued before > > a number of times), it has *NO* implications for the > > behavior of others. > > > > It does NOT mean, for example, that if someone who > > is enlightened tells you to do something, you should > > do it. It does NOT mean that if the enlightened > > person does Bad Things him/herself, you should accept > > them. > > > > This is where folks tend to get fouled up. > > > > The "perfection," if it exists, is in the enlightened > > person saying, "Do this." Nature "wants" the person > > to say that. > > > > But Nature does not necessarily "want" you to do it, > > only for the enlightened person to *tell* you to do > > it. Nature may "want" you to say to yourself, "That's > > dumb, I'm not going to do that." > > > > Nature "wants" the person to do the Bad Things (we > > cannot know why), but NOT for everyone else to > > accept them. Nature may "want" others to be outraged > > and prevent the person from doing the Bad Things, or > > punish him/her for having done them. > > > > It all goes back to the old "Unfathomable is the > > course of action." You can't second-guess it; you > > aren't relieved of the necessity of making your > > own decisions. The "perfection" of the enlightened > > person's actions is relevant ONLY to the > > enlightened person. > > > > Those of us in ignorance shouldn't respond to the > > enlightened person any differently than we do to > > anybody else. That the person is enlightened is > > irrelevant to the rest of us. > > > > > And who thinks that this piece of dogma is a self- > > > serving and often-abused piece of...uh...ignorance that > > > deserves to be flushed down the commode once and for all? > > > > The dogma that the enlightened person's actions are > > "perfect" is one thing. The dogma that THEREFORE you > > should accept everything the enlightened person does > > is something else entirely. That's the piece that's > > ignorant, IMHO. > > >
